WTO Hobbling When The World Needs It

THE 13th Ministerial Conference of the WTO (MC13) ended with a whimper recently in Abu Dhabi, with trade ministers of the 166-member organisation barely stitching up a declaration to show for their efforts.

- BISWAJIT DHAR

In truth, not much was expected from MC13 for two related reasons. First, the organisation is mired in crisis, with deep divisions among the membership regarding the way forward to keep it going. Second, the differences amongst them needed to be sorted out, and dominant countries needed to show sufficient political will to resolve their differences. These are tall asks even during normal years, but when the realities of 2024 are factored in-especially elections in most major economies and an impending slowdown of the global economy the asks look even more daunting.

In today's reality, when economic nationalism has become the mantra, there is little political support for trade. Project globalisation, fuelled by expanding production networks or global value chains, finds itself in choppy waters as the value chains have slowly but surely weakened. The pandemic dealt another telling blow. The final nail is the political turmoil between the Western alliance and China that turned the former countries inward-looking in an effort to decouple from the 'factory of the world'. With trade losing ground in the political pecking order, there was hardly a chance the WTO could receive political backing in Abu Dhabi.