Barbados has officially become the 60th member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) to join the Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (MPIA), a temporary mechanism designed to resolve trade disputes among participating members.
The announcement was made by Barbados’ ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations, WTO, and other international organizations in Geneva, Matthew Wilson, during the WTO General Council meeting.
The MPIA provides an alternative dispute resolution framework amid challenges within the WTO’s Appellate Body, reflecting Barbados’ strong commitment to maintaining the legal integrity of the multilateral trading system.
“I am pleased to inform that Barbados will become a party to the MPIA,” Ambassador Wilson said. “This sends a signal that small, vulnerable economies like Barbados care about the multilateral trading system and want to invest in it.”
The two-day General Council meeting marked the final high-level engagement of WTO member states in Geneva ahead of the 14th Ministerial Conference in Yaoundé, Cameroon, scheduled later this month. Barbados’ delegation to the conference will be led by Senior Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Christopher Sinckler, who will also coordinate the 66 WTO member states of the Organization of Africa, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) States.
During the meeting, Ambassador Wilson addressed issues including WTO reform, the e-commerce moratorium, and trade priorities for small vulnerable economies. He also presented ministerial packages for the informal working group on medium, small, and micro economies, which Barbados chairs, and for the dialogue on plastics pollution, where the country serves as a co-convener.
Last week, Barbados hosted an ACP retreat featuring WTO Director-General Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, representatives from the World Economic Forum and the International Chamber of Commerce, and ambassadors from Argentina, Canada, China, New Zealand, South Africa, the UK, and the European Union. The retreat resulted in an ACP Ministerial Declaration outlining the group’s priorities for the WTO Ministerial Conference, covering agriculture, services, digital trade, fisheries, WTO reform, and development.
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