Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala called on members of the WTO on 4 October to step up efforts to deliver a possible outcome on cotton for the organization’s 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13) next February, noting that cotton producers in least developed countries are grappling with numerous challenges that are negatively impacting the sector and the livelihoods of those depending on the crop.
In remarks delivered at the opening of “World Cotton Day 2023” hosted by the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) in Vienna, the Director-General admitted that 20 years of negotiations at the WTO on the trade aspects of cotton have failed to reach their final and main result.
“There is no point sugar-coating things: over the past 20 years, WTO members have not made progress on cotton in the context of the negotiations on agriculture,” she said.
“Persistent distortions in international markets impede the fair participation of many cotton-producing countries. This is a collective failure, one there is no running away from. But we won't give up trying to get the right outcomes for cotton producers in our negotiations.”
“The coming weeks offer a short window of opportunity for our members to define and pursue what they consider to be an appropriate cotton outcome at MC13,” DG Okonjo-Iweala added.
“I call on members, and particularly the C-4 (Cotton-4), to engage with each other to explore possible landing zones … and define the contours of a possible MC13 outcome on cotton.”
MC13 will take place from 26 to 29 February in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
Cotton is discussed at the WTO under two complementary tracks: trade aspects, involving multilateral negotiations to address distorting subsidies and trade barriers for cotton; and development assistance provided to cotton production and its value chain.
The talks are the result of the “Sectoral Initiative on Cotton” from the C-4 — Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mali (subsequently joined by Côte d'Ivoire) — establishing cotton as a priority on the multilateral trading system's agenda.
