GENEVA: World Trade Organization chief Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala expressed cautious optimism on Sunday that more than 100 trade ministers meeting in Geneva would achieve one or two global deals this week, but warned the path there would be bumpy and rocky.
The director-general from Nigeria said the world had changed since the WTO’s last ministerial conference nearly five years ago.
“I wish I could say for better. It has certainly become more complicated,” she told a news conference before the June 12-15 meeting, listing the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine, and major food and energy crises as pieces of a “polycrisis”.
As a sign of divisions among the WTO’s 164 members, some 30-40 nations walked out when Russia’s Vice-Minister Vladimir Ilyichev took to the floor.
WTO gathering: the battlegrounds
Earlier, trade ministers from the European Union and 29 other WTO members met with Ukraine to express their solidarity and support and wish to alleviate food supply problems. Speaking to ministers at the opening, the WTO chief urged them to “show the world that the WTO can step up to the plate” and achieve agreements on subjects such as reducing fishing subsidies, boosting access to COVID-19 vaccines, addressing food security and setting a course for reform of the WTO itself.
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