Civil Society at WTO’s 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13) in Abu Dhabi call for pro-development outcome, end to WTO expansion agenda

In-person press briefing with civil society present at WTO’s MC13

There is a very anti-development text on the table in fisheries subsidies, and the agriculture outcomes will likely do little to address global food security while punting serious reforms off into the future.

Perhaps most existentially, developed countries are pushing a “WTO reform” agenda that threatens the very basis of the WTO – multilateralism and consensus – in favor of plurilaterals, differentiation among developing countries, and an even more direct role and power for corporations – expanding the failed WTO model rather than transforming it.

Join us to hear from communities who will be directly affected by the outcome of the WTO’s negotiations this week, but have been sidelined by the WTO, in an effort to keep the illegal Green Rooms and anti-development negotiations out of the light of day.

Speakers and Issues:

• Deborah James, Director of International Programs at Center for Economic and Policy Research and Facilitator of Our World Is Not for Sale global network, USA, on WTO process and history
• Victor Menotti, Demand Climate Justice, Slovenia, on “environmental” JSIs
• Parminder Jeet Singh, JustNet Coalition, India, the e-commerce moratorium
• Fikerman Saragih, KIARA fisherfolk organization, Indonesia, on fisheries negotiations
• Ranja Sengupta, Senior Researcher with Third World Network, India, on agriculture and food security
• Kinda Mohamadieh, Senior Researcher & Legal Advisor with Third World Network, Lebanon, on rich country efforts to undermine special and differential treatment and the negotiations on the Ministerial Declaration
• Africa Kiiza, Africa Trade Network, Uganda, on concerns across Africa
• Diego Lopez, International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), on workers’ rights issues