Ministerial meeting of G-20 member countries will begin at Bhurban on Friday to formulate recommendations for the 6th ministerial meeting of the WTO to be held in Hong Kong in December 2005. The meeting will also discuss various proposals for the promotion of trade and safeguarding the interest 61 member countries.
The G-20 emerged as a group of developing countries members of the WTO on August 20, 2003, Just prior to the Cancun Ministerial Conference, in order to forcefully represent developing countries interests in the WTO agricultural negotiations.
The Group was formed with the objective of combating the prevalent distortions in agriculture trade, mainly due to huge subsidies being granted by the developed countries to their farmers and also the very high import duties maintained by them on the imports of agriculture products of the developing countries.
The Group was established for safeguarding the interests of the millions of farmers across the developing world whose livelihoods are being threatened due to unfair agriculture trade practices of the developed countries.
The Ministers of the G-20 had held a number of meetings but so far only two standalone meetings of the G-20 have been organised ie in Brazil and India.
This Meeting is being hosted by Pakistan I or the K first time and Minister for Commerce, Humayun Akhtar Khan will co-chair the proceedings.