IPS Executive Director Highlights WTO Issues of Interest to Commonwealth Asian Countries

05 – 06 June 2018
New Delhi, India

IPS Executive Director, Dushni Weerakoon, attended the Commonwealth-CII Consultation on Multilateral, Regional and Emerging Trade Issues for Asia on 05 – 06 June 2018, in New Delhi, India. She was a panelist at the session on ‘World Trade Organisation (WTO) Issues of Interest to Commonwealth Asian Countries’, which examined the WTO issues of interest to Commonwealth Asian countries, particularly in the wake of the 11th Ministerial Conference and on the way forward.

Dr. Weerakoon argued that collective efforts are needed to put forward common positions on fishery subsidies and domestic support for agriculture given their importance to issues of livelihoods and food security for a large of developing countries and LDCs in the Asian Commonwealth group. Given the rising significance of e-commerce as the world economy transits to digitization and other forms of technological transformation, she also argued that developing countries of the Commonwealth should stay engaged in the plulilateral process underway after the WTO 11th Ministerial in Buenos Aires in 2017.