World Trade Organisation Ministerial Conference

Tuesday 5th March 2024 Written Statements

[The Secretary of State for Business and Trade (Kemi Badenoch)]

Last week, I attended the World Trade Organisation’s 13th ministerial conference MC13—in Abu Dhabi with the Minister of State for Trade Policy, my right hon. Friend, the Member for Chelsea and Fulham (Greg Hands).

MC13 saw the world’s Trade Ministers come together to discuss the most pressing challenges facing global trade and agree a way forward.

The WTO members agreed several outcomes, including:

extending the moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions, which protects tariff-free digital trade, thereby maintaining lower costs and predictability for business engaging in digital trade;

re-committing to find a solution to restore the dispute settlement impasse, which is necessary to uphold global rules of free, fair and open trade and to ensure that every member of the WTO has access to a system to protect their trading interests against the unfair practices of other members;

extending the moratorium on TRIPS—trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights—non-violation and situation complaints;

a small package of outcomes on development, including easing the transition for countries graduating from “least developed country” to “developed country”, such as Angola and Bangladesh;

the Abu Dhabi ministerial declaration, which emphasises the importance of work on a range of important areas, including WTO reform, women’s economic empowerment, services trade and supporting micro, small, and medium enterprises.

MC13 also celebrated the accession of two new members to the WTO—Comoros and Timor-Leste—which will bring the total number of WTO members to 166 and help developing countries reap the benefits of free trade.

At the conference, we celebrated the entry into force of new disciplines under the Services Domestic Regulation Joint Initiative, which could lead to global savings of £99 billion through facilitating trade in services.

The UK is also pleased to have completed the investment facilitation for development agreement, which commits its 127 signatories to practical steps to make it easier to invest in developing countries. This means UK investors should benefit from reduced transaction costs in low-income countries under this agreement, which could increase stocks of outward UK FDI by £2.5 billion in participating members. The agreement will also cut red tape, providing a one-stop shop for investors to communicate with Government, and the creation of a single website that investors can go to for information.

The UK remains committed to the rules-based multilateral trading system as vital to the economic prosperity and trading stability of all the WTO’s 166 members. MC13 did not deliver on all of the UK’s objectives and was a stark reminder of the challenge of agreeing change on the consensus basis of the WTO. However, the WTO remains a critical, albeit imperfect, part of the global trading system that helps deliver global economic growth.

MC13 was also a great opportunity to meet with my international counterparts, including the Gulf Co-operation Council, the United States Trade Representative and the EU Executive Vice-President to progress MC13 negotiations, the New Zealand and Australian Trade Ministers to discuss implementation of the UK’s free trade agreements, and the Canadian Trade Minister to discuss bilateral trade relations, including rules of origin.

[HCWS310]