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No Progress On Doha Agenda At WTO's 'Reality Check
At a much-awaited informal meeting of the WTO General Council (GC) on 30-31 July, Members remained far apart on agreement over elements of an agenda for the WTO’s Fourth Ministerial Conference from 9-13 November in Doha, Qatar. Intended as a ‘reality check’ 100 days before the Ministerial, Members failed to use the opportunity to advance…
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LDCs Say 'Not Ready' For New Round
Trade ministers from the 49 Least-Developed Countries (LDCs) met in Zanzibar, Tanzania on 22-24 July and formed a common front towards the upcoming WTO Ministerial Conference in Doha. The meeting was an initiative of the Tanzanian government to build consensus among LDCs outside the UN framework. In a statement widely taken to be a rejection…
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TRIPs Continues Discussions On Medicines
WTO Members at an informal meeting of the WTO Council for Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPs) on 25 July discussed issues related to TRIPs and access to medicines in preparation for the next formal TRIPs Council meeting in September and the WTO Ministerial Conference in Doha, Qatar, in November. After raising a broad…
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GMO Update: EU Labelling Of GMOs; Brazil; Thailand
European Commission proposes new GM regulations The European Commission on 25 July released their long-awaited proposals for new labelling and traceability regulations related to genetically modified organisms (GMOs) aimed at ending the European de facto moratorium on GMO approval, in place since mid-1999. Together with the recently adopted…
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Dispute Settlement Update: Aircraft, Anti-dumping, Shrimp-Turtle
A WTO panel last Thursday, 26 July, issued yet another ruling in the ongoing aircraft subsidy saga involving Brazil’s regional aircraft maker Embraer and its Canadian rival Bombardier. WTO Members also held a Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) meeting on 24 July, addressing several requests for panels regarding the…
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Agriculture: EC Wants Food Safety In Negotiations
Continuing their informal discussions at the Committee on Agriculture last week, 23-25 July, Members covered the six areas: export subsidies, export credits, state trading enterprises, export taxes and restrictions, food security, and food safety (see also BRIDGES Weekly, 24 July 2001). Food safety At the meeting, The EC submitted a controversial paper on food safety…
- In Brief
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French Infringement of the EU-US Banana Deal
On 25 July, the European Commission called on France to comply with the banana import deal reached between the EU and US in April 2001 to resolve their long- running trade dispute (see BRIDGES Weekly, 1 May 2001). The Commission threatened to take France to the European Court of Justice, alleging that…
- WTO in Brief
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Climate Change Negotiations Almost Completed
Following the political agreement on the implementation details of the Kyoto Protocol at the Resumed Sixth Session of the Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP-6bis) in Bonn, Germany — adopted on Wednesday as the ‘Bonn Agreement’ (see BRIDGES Weekly, 24 July 2001) — delegates…
- Events
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Events
EVENTS For a more comprehensive list of events in trade and sustainable development, please refer to ICTSD’s web calendar at: http://www.ictsd.org/cal/index.htm. Coming Up This Week 10-12 September, Interlaken, Switzerland: LINKING WORK, SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE: LEARNING FOR SURVIVAL AND GROWTH. Organised by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation. For further information, contact:…
- Resources
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Resources
If you have a relevant resource (books, papers, bulletins, etc.) you would like to see announced in this section, please forward a copy for review by the BRIDGES staff to Hugo Cameron, hcameron@ictsd.ch. Submissions of publications to ICTSD’s documentation centre would also be welcome (contact Marc Galvin, mgalvin@ictsd.ch). WTO POLICY…