On Monday, the director general of the organization, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, asked its members to intensify their efforts to achieve substantive results at the next Twelfth Ministerial Conference of the Organization (MC12).

The event, to take place in Geneva from June 12th to 15th, will be an important space to discuss issues such as the food crisis, a credible response to the Covid-19 pandemic, the negotiations on fisheries subsidies and the reform of the organization, among others.

Okonjo-Iweala insisted that the world needs a responsive WTO, “one that helps us meet the many challenges of our time and meets the aspirations of the people we serve.”

She stressed that the WTO has not held a Ministerial Conference since the end of 2017, so preparatory work will be useful to help take advantage of the debate spaces of a meeting planned for five years.

For his part, the President of the General Council, Didier Chambovey, stressed to the members that making the next conference a meaningful space was not only a shared goal, but also a necessity.

“Let us intensify all our efforts to prepare and finalize as much as we can in the coming weeks before our ministers arrive,” he declared.

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