Is there a need for restructuring the collaboration among the WTO and un agencies so as to harness their complementarities?

Abstract

Given the broad objectives of the WTO, it is not surprising that there is need for effective collaboration with a number of UN agencies. One specific example relates to sustainable development. At the launching of the WTO Doha Development Agenda in Qatar in November 2001, the trade ministers strongly reaffirmed their ‘commitment to the objective of sustainable development . . .’. At the United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development in September 2002 in Johannesburg, ministers committed themselves to continue ‘to promote open, equitable, rules-based, predictable and non-discriminatory multilateral trading . . .’. Notwithstanding such declarations, it is argued that there is scope for..