WTO Financial News

G20 Summit on Saturday reiterated their commitment towards reform of the World Trade Organization (WTO), dispute settlement and that trade and environment policies should be mutually supportive consistent with global trade rules and multilateral environmental agreements. In the New Delhi Leaders’ Declaration, the grouping- which added the African Union as its new permanent member- emphasised on avoiding discriminatory green economic policies. “We renew our commitment to ensure a level-playing field and fair competition by discouraging protectionism and market distorting practices, to foster a favourable trade and investment environment for all,” the bloc said, highlighting its commitment to 'positive outcomes at the WTO’s Thirteenth Ministerial Conference (MC13).' The 37-page declaration has the trade and investment agenda in a subhead titled 'Unlocking Trade for Growth.' “We affirm that a rules-based, non-discriminatory, fair, open, inclusive, equitable, sustainable and transparent multilateral trading system, with WTO at its core, is indispensable,” they said.

WTO, became defunct, thus affecting developing countries adversely. One hopes that PM Narendra Modi can impress upon US President Joe Biden at the G20 summit to restore it and help the global south and multilateralism. Under India's G20 presidency, it was hoped that G20 economies would demonstrate their collective commitment to AB's restoration.

ASEAN Summit in Indonesia and G20 Summit in India this month, chief cabinet secretary Hirokazu Matsuno told reporters on Tuesday as reported by Reuters. 3. In another news, the Japanese PM Fumio Kishida also announced that a 20.7 billion yen ($141 million) emergency fund to help exporters hit by China's ban on Japanese seafood over the release of treated radioactive wastewater from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant.

TOKYO (Reuters) -Japan threatened on Tuesday to take China to the World Trade Organization to seek a reversal of Beijing's ban on all of its seafood imports after the release of treated radioactive water from the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Global trade volumes will grow at a “moderate pace” in the third quarter of the year, continuing the uptick from the prior period after two quarters of decline, the World Trade Organization said. The WTO’s periodic goods barometer jumped to 99.1 from the previous reading of 95.6 announced in May, the Geneva-based organization said in a report published Thursday. The baseline of 100 indicates growth over the next quarter that’s in line with medium-term trends. High commodity prices, tighter monetary conditions, and anemic import demand have weighed on global trade volumes, the report said.

NEW DELHI : A record number of World Trade Organization (WTO) members have raised concerns about rising protectionist moves in global trade, propelling the issue to centre stage at the 13th WTO Ministerial Conference (MC13) in Abu Dhabi in February, an official aware of the development said. Many developing nations, including India, are set to oppose the European Union’s (EU’s) carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) that aims to tax imports of carbon-intensive products such as steel, aluminium, cement, and electricity. The EU is also expected to file a complaint against the US’s Inflation Reduction Act because the $430 billion subsidy to manufacturers of green technology will distort international prices and is against WTO norms.

World Trade Organization (WTO) on Tuesday said that two separate dispute settlement panels have stated that India and the US have mutually resolved disputes with regard to certain measures on steel and aluminium products, and additional duties on certain products from the US. On July 13, the two countries notified that they had reached a mutually agreed solution to the matters raised in the two disputes.

New Delhi: The Centre anticipates objections from World Trade Organization (WTO) members over the recently imposed import restriction on IT hardware such as computers and electronic items but believes the move won’t lead to the opening of a formal dispute at the international trade body, a government official said. Trade experts believe India, which imports over $8 billion of the listed products, could be dragged to the WTO for the restriction. Fears of a pushback from countries also come against the backdrop of an ongoing WTO dispute over Indian import duty on information communications technology (ICT) products with half-a-dozen countries.

World Trade Organization (WTO) early next year, commerce and industry minister Piyush Goyal cautioned emerging markets, developing countries and the least developed countries of the developed countries’ “game of dividing” them to get agreements on fisheries and e-commerce moratorium that address the needs of a few countries only. At the Confederation of Indian Industry’s (CII) India-Latin America & Caribbean (LAC) Region Conclave, he said that at the last WTO ministerial, many countries were trying to divide such countries through “small sops”.

carbon tax, on their domestic industry, during WTO ministerial meeting next year, an official said. The four-day 13th ministerial conference (MC) of the World Trade Organization (WTO) is scheduled for February 26 next year in Abu Dhabi. MC is the highest decision-making body of WTO. «These issues will come up in the WTO in a big way. Countries like India will oppose these measures in the WTO,» the official said. In the first seven months of this year, the EU has introduced four regulations on climate change and trade. These are carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM); deforestation regulation; including shipping in the EU's emissions trade system; and Foreign subsidies regulation. EU member Germany too has announced a supply chain due diligence act (SCDDA). «This will become a major issue in the MC13. Many member countries have already submitted papers against some of these regulations in the WTO. It looks like discussions will happen on these regulations and a general view will also converge,» the government official, who did not wish to be named, said. Geneva-based 164 member multi-lateral body WTO deals with global exports and import-related norms. Besides, it adjudicates trade disputes between the member countries.

India not to ratify the fisheries subsidies agreement agreed upon by the World Trade Organisation members in Geneva last year and instead commence talks for a comprehensive pact.Members of the Geneva-based WTO on June 17, 2022, secured a 'Geneva Package' which included agreements on curbing harmful fishing subsidies and temporary patent waivers for the production of COVID-19 vaccines. The fisheries agreement finalised would prohibit developed countries, engaged in distant water fishing, not to provide subsidies for illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing activities. However, the countries have to negotiate about the other issues of the agreement which include overfishing and overcapacity.

New Delhi mandates a non-GMO and GM-free status certificate from exporting countries for 24 food products, including apples, wheat, rice, tomato and potato. In a submission to the WTO on Tuesday, it asked India to revoke the measure.

WTO) Bali conference that prevents legal action against any developing nation that breaches the food subsidy limits specified in the agreement on agriculture. At an agriculture negotiation meeting at the WTO on Monday, the US said India’s expansion of support to its rice and wheat farmers has negative spillover effects. India has invoked the clause thrice. “India said that the strongest evidence supporting the necessity of public stockholding was in its own actions during the pandemic, when it mobilised its food stocks and provided food to 80 million people in 18 months’ span,” said a Geneva-based official. Public stockholding is a policy tool used by governments to purchase, stockpile and distribute food when needed. Developing countries’ food subsidies are protected by an interim peace clause which shields food procurement programmes against action from WTO members in case the subsidy ceilings—10% of value of food production in the case of India and other developing countries—are breached.

India and the US have informed the World Trade Organization (WTO) on the mutual resolution all the six trade disputes, in line with the commitment they made last month. In five separate notifications to the WTO on Tuesday, they asked the multilateral trade watchdog to terminate these disputes.

India and the US have mutually resolved all six trade disputes pending at the World Trade Organisation (WTO), in line with the commitment made by the two countries during the US visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi last month, an official said. The official said that both countries have informed the WTO's dispute settlement body (DSB) about the resolution of all the pending disputes.

India, Russia and Brazil, on Friday raised concerns over the EU's deforestation law, at the World Trade Organisation. Terming the EU's policy directive «unfortunate», New Delhi said that it will directly harm the economic interests of women and small enterprises.

India has doubled its share of global commercial services exports to 4.4 per cent in 2022 from 2 per cent in 2005, according to a World Bank and World Trade Organisation (WTO) report. "China and India doubled their share of global commercial services exports from 2005 to 2022, from 3.0 per cent to 5.4 per cent, and from 2.0 per cent to 4.4 per cent, respectively," it said.

commercial services exports to 4.4% in 2022 from 2% in 2005, the World Bank and World Trade Organization (WTO) said Monday. In a report titled ‘Trade in services for development’, they said that in India, South Africa and Türkiye, jobs directly linked to cross-border services exports account for more than 10% of total services sector jobs.

GENEVA (Reuters) — The heads of the World Bank and the World Trade Organization on Monday called for countries to boost efforts to make trade in global services more transparent and predictable, saying this could help developing countries reduce poverty.

The war in Ukraine and stubborn inflation around the world are expected to hold back growth in global trade this year, restraining the pace of economic recovery even as the world emerges from the height of the pandemic.

The war in Ukraine and stubborn inflation around the world are expected to hold back growth in global trade this year, restraining the pace of economic recovery even as the world emerges from the height of the pandemic.