By: Kimberly Ramkhalawan
June 24, 2022
The meeting took place during June 12-17 at WTO’s headquarters in Geneva. Coming on the heels of MC 12, members of the CARICOM Secretariat are dissecting the latest agreements signed onto and giving a report on how it will impact small island developing states, SIDS.
Dubbed the Geneva Package, the agreement secures a number of key trade initiatives underlying the importance of multilateral trading system and the role the WTO has in addressing the issues of importance and most some of the most critical problems faced globally at this time.
Dr.Chantal Ononaiwu, Trade Policy and Legal Specialist at the CARICOM Secretariat discussing the outcomes and CARICOM’s roles with Salas Hamilton, Communications Specialist at the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME) Unit at the Secretariat, mentions it had been stymied for a lengthy period, citing that very few multilateral trade agreements had been concluded since 1995, the most recent being the 2013 trade facilitation agreement. However, since then too many developments have occurred resulting in a prompt of the global organization to respond.
The participation of CARICOM states at the meeting saw 13 of its 15 member states who are also members of the WTO present in Geneva. The two non-WTO members being Montserrat and The Bahamas, of which The Bahamas is currently undergoing negotiations to become a member, and also had a presence at this year’s meeting to witness the discussions at hand.
Dr.Onanaiwu says its presence meant showing the significance small economies hold in value to a rules-based multilateral trading system that operates under the WTO, affording CARICOM states participation on an equal footing and to ‘positively re-engage’ as a region with large trading partners.
One of the outcomes the meeting resulted in, was ministers adopting a decision on the work programme on small economies. While small vulnerable economies often face challenges unique to them as to how they participate in the global trade economy, Dr.Onanaiwu says there is also ‘constraints on small size, limited resources, lack of economies of scale, and susceptible to natural disasters’ as just some of what they face. The last work programme established dates back to 2001, and facilitates responses being developed to trade related issues which is also supported by small economies programme that would enable small vulnerable economies to continue to seek the requisite flexibilities.
Described as one of the major outcomes to arise from MC12, the Fishery subsidies agreement, places constraints on WTO members, that would provide harmful subsidies that would lead to the global depletion of fish stocks. The move is said to come after twenty years of being on the table, providing a case study or an illustration of how difficult it can be to achieve consensus among differing members within the group. And while Dr. Onanaiwu says one expects that after 20 years, the issues at play should have been thoroughly ventilated and by now fully understood and viewed as whether there was political will to deliver on an outcome. This also falls into many countries now being able to meet an important deliverable outlined within the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, UN SDGs, which prohibits harmful fish subsidies.
Apart from this, it gives rise to supporting the availability of fish stocks for Caribbean countries, all while securing the livelihoods of its people to provide food for itself locally, while contributing to the development of the region’s blue economies.
Dr. Ononaiwu added that other areas resulting in outcomes, included a look at the pandemic response and its impact had on smaller states. Resolutions at the WTO saw the decision reached where eligible WTO developing members could actually override COVID-19 Vaccine patents for the production and supply of COVID-19 vaccines up to the year 2027. It was also decided that in six months’ time, members are to convene if they wished to extend this waiver to therapeutics and diagnostics. And while the majority of Caribbean islands do not possess the capacity to produce either of these, Dr. Ononaiwu said discussions resulted in regional participants given the assurance under this waiver, that vaccines Caribbean states that actually patent within their own countries can import them freely and quickly, and if necessary re-export them to other partners in the region. She stated that the pandemic response also extended to other areas that need to be prepared for future pandemics, including restraining its use in export restrictions. As seen during the pandemic, restrictions hampered the ability member countries to get supplies needed all while travel restrictions impacted tourism based economies in the region.
Also on the agenda, was the response during the pandemic to ensure Caribbean nations were afforded the medical resources such as vaccines, resulting in deliverables being met from the ministerial conference.
And while currently the world is in a food crisis made worse by the current Ukraine Russia war, key statements and the impacts it’s been having on the multilateral trading system, WTO members were able to engage in discussions that resulted in the opportunity to set future agricultural work programmes for Caribbean nations, ensuring outcomes where CARICOM countries could safeguard certain flexibilities allowing the provision of the space for farmers to supply markets.
Critical to the meeting given global circumstances included net food importing countries. It was said that even though there were initiatives to boost agriculture processes in the region, CARICOM lobbied for outcomes that ensured WTO members trade in their imposition of world food imported items, which included food imported for the world food humanitarian crisis.
Meanwhile, it was also discussed that the future work programme be set in motion for the reform of the WTO, which includes an open process which works toward a dispute resolutions system members can access by 2024.
Dr. Ononaiwu says CARICOM included that its members continue to have an equal say at the forum where there be improvements to the negotiating function, and to the dispute settlement function that ensures the interests of countries that are particularly small members, continue to have equal consideration.
Coordination of Trade Policy is a feature of its economic integration arrangement, and also extends to how CARICOM members participate in the WTO, providing a stronger voice for Caribbean states at the Multilateral level.
This year saw Guyana serve as the lead spokesperson at the WTO, while also chairing meetings at CARICOM’s caucus. Preparations among member states were said to coordinated, with trade ministers deliberating how they should approach this year’s meeting, while Geneva based diplomats played a role in negotiating CARICOM’s position at the meeting as a group and as part of the wider coalition of African Caribbean Pacific states.