Almost two decades after the establishment of the WTO, developing countries have demonstrated increasing interest and participation in the WTO dispute settlement system. Trade-related issues have also been raised by developing WTO Members in meetings of the various WTO committees with a view to taking an important step towards addressing those concerns and perhaps avoiding a full-blown dispute settlement proceeding. Recourse to dispute settlement mechanisms outside the WTO, for example, in the various regional trade institutions, although not with the same frequency as that to the WTO dispute settlement mechanism, could also not be ignored.
It is essential, if not indispensable, for any country to succeed in identifying, raising and solving those trade concerns through various fora to have the requisite legal capacity in order to keep abreast with the increasing complexity of the trade field in general.
For most developing countries, lack of legal capacity is one of major hurdles in engaging in and fully benefiting from international trade regimes. Legal capacity means solid institutional structures that allow for effective inter-governmentaland multi-stakeholder coordination, processes that support and regulate the involvementof industry,trade law expertise,and national legislation that allows for effective implementation.
This workshop is ultimately aimed, at increasing the level of legal capacity of participating African countries, through a exchange of ideas and relevant experiences.
This event is one of several, under the tripartite programme of the WTO, ACWL and ICTSD, which are geared towards capacity building in highly technical and specialized areas.
Combining Strengths
The tripartite partnership, which benefits from the unique strengths of the three institutions, is financed through a grant by Finland, and includes a series of regional and sectoral workshops that are aimed at identifying and developing best-practices of developing countries in WTO dispute settlement and other highly specialized areas.
The three partner institutions have thus far jointly organized five activities. The first event which kickstarted the project was a global initiative entitled South-South Dialogue on Managing Trade Litigation which was held in Geneva in May 2012. The participants shared their experiences in participating in the WTO dispute settlement process with the aim of identifying best practices in handling WTO disputes. This was followed a series of regional and sectoral events: Asia Regional Dialogue on Managing Trade Disputes, which was held in New Delhi in 2012; Workshop on Trade Remedies which was held in Beijing in 2013; Latin America Regional Dialogue on Managing Trade Disputes, held in Brasilia in 2013; and a Workshop on Handling Trade and Environment Disputes, which was held in Geneva in early 2014.
The tripartite partnership, which benefits from the unique strengths of the three institutions, is financed through a grant by Finland, and includes a series of regional and sectoral workshops that are aimed at identifying and developing best-practices of developing countries in WTO dispute settlement and other highly specialized areas.
In this context,the WTO provides the institutional and procedural
perspective, ACWL offers its unmatched expertise in litigation, and ICTSD makes full use of its unique knowledge base on domestic and non-governmental realities.
