WTO seeks to ease entry rules for poorer countries

Members countries of the World Trade Organisation hope to adopt new rules aimed at easing entry for least developed countries, Canadian International Trade Minster Ed Fast said on Wednesday. "We're hoping by the summer break that most of the work can be complete," Fast said on the sidelines of an OECD ministerial meeting in Paris. "We're talking about a revised system of rules under which LDCs could accede to the WTO," the minister said.
"Right now the LDCs complain that the standards that we've set are so high and the criteria we've set are so stringent it makes it very difficult if not impossible for them to join the WTO," he noted. "We're moving in the right direction. Whether that can be achieved by summer isn't certain but it's certainly a goal we've set in our meeting earlier today," the minister indicated.