There was an urgent need for capacity building in the field of world trade organisation (WTO) and in this regard the Ministry of Commerce should induct professionals from the private sector. Speakers expressed these views while addressing a four-day seminar on WTO, which was concluded at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) here, on Friday. The stakeholders attended the seminar from the industry as well as government representatives and WTO experts.
The seminar was organised to formulate a policy for future recourse available to the local industry in the post 2005 scenario.
The seminar, led by course director Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, included Mehnaz Shiraz, Shandana Gulzar Khan, Muhammad Anum Saleem and Nawazish Pirzada as speakers, all legal experts on WTO. The representatives of National Tariff Commission (NTC) also attended the seminar and Qasim Niaz and Akhtar Mehmood Joint Secretary chaired the concluding session in the WTO Cell of Ministry of Commerce.
Some of the sectors covered during the seminar included textile, agriculture, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, banking, footwear and automobile. Market access issue emerged as a key challenge to the local industry during deliberations.
The strategy formulations at the end of the seminar included an urgent need for establishing reliable and effective data and statistics compilation agencies for the industries. Moreover, a need for government/industry nexus for the government to effectively negotiate at the international level on behalf of local industry.
They also called for creating awareness among stakeholders as well as their representative associations and a need for more proactive role on the part of government since there is no room for individual representation at the WTO dispute settlement forums.
The speakers lamented the fact that despite the presence of various local lawyers, who were equipped with the expertise of handling WTO disputes, the local industry was continuing to hire the services of international lawyers based in Geneva at much higher prices. Such a process, according to the speakers, had a chilling effect on the domestic producers and many of them abstained from taking their dispute to the Dispute Settlement Body of WTO.
The seminar concluded requiring an immediate attention of the government and industry regarding the issue of exploration of new markets in the textile sector in view of the imposition of anti dumping duty by the EU on Pakistani bed-linen, the immediate promulgation of Geographical Indication Ordinance in the agriculture sector and the protection of domestic pharmaceutical industry from a hostile take-over by the multinational companies by making appropriate amendments in the Patent Ordinance.