Business enters direct dialogue with WTO

BUSINESS LEADERS have entered their first direct dialogue with the World Trade Organisation to
hammer out an agenda of contemporary challenges needing WTO action. Disruptive technologies,
E-commerce, freer people movement and finance for SMEs are on the list . . .

Issues ranging from global rules for cross-border E-commerce to sourcing of alternative finance for small business were raised at the first World Trade Organisation dialogue with business in Geneva in May.
At the long overdue meeting, 60 business leaders representing both micro businesses and large multinationals from developed and developing countries asked the WTO to take on board emerging issues as part of its future work programme.
The meeting, organised by the Paris-based International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) and the B-20, business advisory panel to the G-20, explored what business leaders see as the new world order in trade. Participants asked for e-commerce to be brought to “centre stage” to help those not connected to the Internet to become connected and get onboard the “e-commerce bandwagon”.
Sunil Mittal, First Vice Chairman of the ICC, told the media that the private sector would like to see digital signatures accepted and a (universal online) payment system put in place that was not discriminatory or protectionist.
Mittal, who is founder and Chairman of Bharti Enterprises, a leading Indian conglomerate, said he hoped the WTO would help facilitate cross-border trade by simplifying regulations and standards for e-commerce.
“The WTO needs to develop rules and standards to make sure that the efficient growth of e-commerce is secured, because it has the potential to revolutionise trade flows around the world,” he said.
Never before had small and micro businesses been able to tap into global trade, with the Internet giving these companies an advantage.
Mittal said another issue was the contentious subject of free global movement of people. Business would like to see freer movement.
Mittal said the private sector was pleased to see that the WTO had successfully negotiated the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA), which is in the process of being ratified. So far, three quarters (82) of all WTO members have ratified the TFA. “We must do the utmost to put this agreement into operation. It has the potential to bring enormous benefits to the world economy”, Mittal said. When fully implemented, it would generate US$1 trillion in additional trade, and 22 million jobs, he added.
The WTO’s success with the trade facilitation agreement had given the private sector “a great deal of optimism” that the organisation could take the free trade agenda further and deeper, said Mittal.
Another participant, Kati Suominen, founder of the TradeUp Capital Fund, a crowd-sourcing platform, said finance — or the lack of it — was the major hurdle to companies engaging in trade. Finance was becoming even more difficult because of new and higher capital requirements, and this was stifling growth, especially for SMEs, which was ironic at a time when there was a rapid rise in the development of
alternative financing and online financing platforms. “This may be a great opportunity for the WTO to explore ways to work with these new players, financing platforms for alternative
finance in the context of export credits and
export finance, and perhaps export credit agencies,” she said.
Souminen added that a small capital injection into some of these small companies would enable them to participate in global trade.
In the 21st century, the WTO could only
succeed if it engaged those that traded across borders every day — businesses, small and big, she said. “As world trade changes and digitises, WTO’s rulemaking, research, and capacity-building functions need to be bolstered and adjusted to meet the needs of private sector stakeholders,” she said.
“This can help unlock the power of trade,
disruptive technologies, e-commerce and FDI to drive inclusive growth, job creation and
sustainable development.” Another issue, she said, was the need for the WTO to help trade associations and governments to understand the rules that had been negotiated.
WTO Secretary-General Roberto Azevêdo, who headed the meeting, said he had heard “some fascinating insights” on the issues that businesses — particularly smaller enterprises — face in the trading system, and ideas on how these issues might be tackled.
“Trade negotiations do not occur in a vacuum, so I think it is important for WTO members to hear directly from business on the challenges they face in the real economy — as well as from consumers, workers and other voices in civil society,” he said.
A WTO source told ATI the Geneva meeting had provided an opportunity for businesses to interact with WTO delegates and each other and to discuss what they would like to see the WTO take up. “Azevedo has been close to
business,” the source said. “It is not lost on the WTO Secretariat that without business support for agreements on trade services and information technology, agreements would not have been reached.”
The source added that if an agreement is something that business really wants, and is prepared to push for,  politicians take note and Government Ministers then have a good reason to say “yes” to a deal.
Twenty years after the WTO’s inception, the source admits that business does not fully
understand the WTO’s role, and that, indeed, the WTO could even be seen as a “bit intimidating”. “What we do here is immensely complicated,” he said. “The idea of a global deal
appeals to everybody. (But) in the past we have been slow to deliver.”