A high level trade confab in Colombo attended by reps from the Commonwealth, Canadaโs IISD, Netherlandโs South Centre, New Delhi reps and top Lankan trade officials is to start mapping the way forward on multilateral trade play of developing countries. Interestingly, the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) is to be a key discussion point in the confab while the Commonwealth Secretariat shall begin support work on the proposed Exim Bank of Sri Lanka during the Colombo sessions that opened on 16 March.
โTrans Pacific Partnership (TPP) has already become a reality. It appears that more and more countries have now begun to look at these mega FTAs due to disappointing WTO outcomesโ said Lankan Minister of Industry and Commerce Rishad Bathiudeen on 16 March in Colombo.
Minister Bathiudeen was addressing the launch of the high level trade confab organized by the Commonwealth Secretariat with the Department of Commerce of Sri Lanka, and partnered by Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD).ย The three day Colombo session โBoosting Trade Competitiveness around Emerging New Issues in Multilateral Trade Agreementsโ is set for an in-depth look at the way forward on global multilateral trade play โespecially of the developing countries- in light of recent major developments as the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) and TTIP and disappointing WTO outcomes since Doha and Nairobi rounds.
โWe all know that how mega agreements such as Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), TTIP have been making headways slowly but steadily. In fact TPP has already become a reality. It appears that more and more countries have now begun to look at these mega FTAs since they seem to have little hope in the WTO-led multi-lateral trade negotiationsโ said Minister Bathiudeen and added: โJust like your own countries, Sri Lanka too has remained highly concerned over the extremely slow progress of the Doha Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations or the Doha Development Agenda (DDA), spearheaded by the WTO. Due to the stalemate, which continues to plague the DDA since its launch in 2001, almost all the countries around the world have been resorting to bilateral and regional free trade agreements, which we commonly refer to as Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs) for trade creation. It is learnt that as many as 625 such RTAs have been notified to the WTO as of last month, while more than 400 of them are actually in force. RTAs are only a temporary and narrow alternative. It is not that easy for countries such as ours, whose manufacturing and service industries suffer from numerous capacity constraints, to figure out whether some RTAs are actually good or bad for them. We were hopeful that the Bali Ministerial would deliver something tangible. However, the only significant achievement the WTO made in Bali is the Trade Facilitation Agreement. The Ministers could not reach any agreement on several areas such as food security, export subsidies and some more critical issues to many of our economies. Although we agreed to work expeditiously and find solutions to these issues on priority basis, the post-Bali progress has been far more disappointing. Therefore it was obvious that Nairobi Ministerial could not deliver anything significant.โ
Head of Trade Competitiveness of Commonwealth Secretariat Rashmi Banga said that the Secretariat shall help draw formulate the proposed Exim Bank of Sri Lanka during the Colombo session. โSri Lankan exporters need better export financing-they are on credit and they donโt have working capital so they have to look for bank overdrafts which the banks are reluctant to issue. The proposed Exim Bank will solve this greatly since SL Export Credit Insurance will guarantee the order and Exim Bank can finance it based on the guarantee. Having learnt of the proposal we at Commonwealth Offices in London gave the first Exim Bank concept paper to the Government of Sri Lanka and we are now ready to give technical assistance to set up. Even the Indian Exim Bank was set up by our technical assistance.โ An Exim Bank to help the Lankan exporters was proposed by the Lankan Finance Minister during his recent Parliamentary budget speech.
Nathalie Bernasconi-Osterwalder (Group Director, Economic Law & Policy – International Institute on Sustainable Development -IISD) said: โWe are at an important point in the history of trade and investment policy making. At the multilateral level, after 15 years of slow progress on the Doha Development Agenda, some countries in the WTO Secretariat are wishing to bring new life to the WTO by introducing new issues that may be tabled for multilateral negotiations. Among the issues are 1996 Singapore Ministerial Conference effects-trade & investment, trade & competition policy, transparency in government procurement, and trade facilitation. These issues are no longer about trade or what happens at border crossing but more about domestic policy making. These emergent issues will be impacted by some of the new mega regional Trade Agreements such as TPP. The new issues for WTO are not so new for these mega FTAs. Now there is a race between governments as to who gets to write the agreement rules. As this race continues, we need to ask-what about the other players; are they treaty makers or treaty takers? The power play at country level is lower but higher at regional levels! For example, what the TPP will be like? Therefore we shall be taking stock of TPP and EU agreements at the Colombo sessions.โ
Among the participants of the three day Colombo sessions are reps from the Commonwealth, Canadaโs IISD, Netherlandโs South Centre, Cโwealthโs Trade Competitive Section, the Third World Network, Centre for WTO Studies of Indian Institute of Foreign Trade, National University of Singapore, Permanent Mission of Ghana to UN, Colomboโs Institute of Policy Studies and top Lankan trade officials from DoC โDG Commerce Sonali Wijeratne- and officials of EDB.
Leader of All Ceylon Makkal Congress