Satoko Adachi – Geneva, Switzerland
Roberto Azevedo, who took office as the new director general of the World Trade Organization in the beginning of this month, warned in his inaugural speech made Monday, September 9, that the organization risks being irrelevant.
In the remarks made at a special meeting of the WTO’s general council, Azevedo referred to the prolonging negotiations of the Doha round, stating that the negotiating arm of the organization was struggling and the failure to address this paralysis casted a shadow over every other part of WTO’s work.
“That’s why success at the Bali ministerial conference is vital,” he stressed, referring to the ministerial meeting to be held in Indonesia in December to reach partial agreement in some of the sectors. He also said that following the ministerial meeting, it will be necessary to discuss how to deal with the rest of the contentious issues to reach agreement in the Doha round. “We must look with fresh eyes at possible options,” he said. “I have ideas about how we can do this,” he added, although refraining from speaking specifically.
He highlighted the significance of multilateral trading system, saying that it “remains the best defense against protectionism and the strongest force for growth, recovery and development.”
In a press conference after the general council meeting, Azevedo said that bilateral and regional-level free trade agreements do not necessarily weaken WTO’s raison d’etre, but added that it is important for WTO to show it can once again negotiate multilaterally. His remarks apparently came in response to views that ongoing negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership talks and a large-scale free-trade agreement between the United States and the European Union are replacing WTO to create a new trade system.
Azevedo worked as a Brazilian ambassador to the WTO since 2008, and is vastly experienced in trade negotiations. Based on the principle of geographical distribution, Azevedo, who is from South America, appointed one deputy director-general each from the U.S., the EU, Asia and Africa. The new deputy directors-general are: David Shark, former U.S. deputy permanent representative to the WTO, Karl-Ernst Brauner, senior officer of Germany’s Federal Department of Economics and Technology, Yi Xiaozhun, former Chinese ambassador to the WTO and Yonov Frederick Agah, former Nigerian ambassador to the WTO.
(Sept. 11, 2013)