Successful completion of the WTO Ministerial Conference

On the morning of June 17, the official closing ceremony of the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference (MC-12), chaired and co-organized by the Republic of Kazakhstan, took place in Geneva.

The First Deputy Head of the Administration of the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, T.M. Suleimenov, acted as the Chairman of MK-12. The meeting of the supreme body of the WTO, which makes decisions and determines the vector of development of world trade, lasted 5 days (and nights). Intensive negotiations of the 164 member countries of the Organization have borne fruit. The countries managed to reach consensus on an unprecedented number of issues that are important for world trade.

In particular, the countries managed to launch the WTO reform process, adopt the Ministerial Declaration on WTO Response Measures to the COVID-19 Pandemic and Preparedness for Future Pandemics, the Ministerial Decision on the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), the Ministerial Declaration on Urgent Measures to Respond to Food Insecurity, the Ministerial Decision on the Exemption of Food Procurement World Food Program goods from Export Bans and Restrictions, E-Commerce Work Program, and also to adopt a new WTO Agreement on fishing subsidies. Negotiations on the latter lasted more than 20 years.

It should be noted that the Ministerial Conference was supposed to end on June 15, but the Ministers agreed to extend the conference for one day.

It should be recalled that the WTO member countries unanimously elected Kazakhstan as the chair and host of the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference in autumn 2018. The conference was to be held in Nur-Sultan in June 2020. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the countries decided to postpone the MK-12 to a later date.