Business, trade experts work to break deadlock in global trade talks

Geneva, 14 March 2012

More than 70 business experts – including CEOs, senior corporate executives, and representatives of business organizations – together with World Trade Organization (WTO) Director-General Pascal Lamy, met in Geneva for the first conference on the ICC Business World Trade Agenda, an initiative of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) proposing that business works together with governments to drive more effective trade talks.

On this occasion, the ICC Research Foundation (ICCRF) supported Peterson Institute (PIIE) policy brief on “The Way Forward in the World Trade Organization” was presented by PIIE senior Fellows Gary Hufbauer and Jeffrey Schott. The brief provides a short diagnosis of Doha Round issues and concise recommendations for moving forward on trade reforms in specific areas, including what can be harvested from the decade-long work in the Doha Round and institutional reforms that would enable “coalitions of the willing” to make deeper progress on the existing agenda and address new challenges that go beyond the current negotiating mandate. It is the key background material for the ICC’s World Trade Agenda initiative discussed at this meeting and was used to define a “draft” business agenda for trade negotiations in the context of a this first conference on the ICC Business World Trade Agenda.

ICC Press Release

Joint WTO-ICC press conference audio