Bridges Trade BioRes • Volume 10 • Number 14 • 23rd July 2010

WTO’s Rules Group Gets a New Chair

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Dennis Francis, WTO Ambassador from Trinidad and Tobago, is the new chair of the Doha Round’s Negotiating Group on Rules. He follows Uruguayan Ambassador Guillermo Valles Galmés, who left the position earlier this year. Valles stepped down as chair earlier this year leaving a legacy of progressive action on fisheries subsidies.

Francis was elected during an informal committee meeting in Geneva on 13 July. Speaking to the group, Francis expressed his commitment to doing everything to move work forward, while recognising that the issues still not agreed will probably be difficult to resolve.

Francis has served as his country’s ambassador to the WTO since 2006; during that time, he acted as chair of the Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) from late 2008 until mid-2009. He is also Trinidad and Tobago’s ambassador to the United Nations, along with several other Geneva-based international organisations.

Francis has been a career diplomat for the past 30 years, serving in a variety of posts. He has worked in several divisions of his country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and served as High Commissioner of Trinidad and Tobago to Jamaica from 1999 until his move to Geneva in 2006.

The rules group focuses on negotiating disciplines on several topics, including fisheries subsidies, anti-dumping, subsidies and countervailing measures, and WTO provisions applying to regional trade agreements (RTAs).

A draft text released in December 2008 by then-chair Valles highlighted some of the areas of discord among group members, such as zeroing. Despite these disagreements, members have made some progress recently in resolving the fisheries subsidies issue, using the roadmap suggested by Valles Galmés in his text (see Bridges Trade BioRes, 23 January 2009 and 14 May 2010).

Sources close to the WTO negotiations say that parties have been hesitant to engage in meaningful negotiation on fisheries subsidies since Valles’ departure earlier this year. It will likely take some time before Francis’ effect on the negotiations becomes apparent.

US Ambassador Michael Punke, in his statement congratulating Francis on his new position, urged the Rules Group to “remain engaged at a technical level to better understand each others’ rules and positions,” in order to soon reach a compromise on the issues still outstanding.

ICTSD reporting; “Summertime Changes for IP Policymakers in Geneva,” IP WATCH, 4 August 2008; “One on One with Dennis Francis,” JAMAICAN GLEANER, 5 June 2006.