Council for Trade in Goods - Report on the WTO response to the COVID-19 pandemic and preparedness for future pandemics - Report by the Council for Trade in Goods and its subsidiary bodies

REPORT ON THE WTO RESPONSE TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
AND PREPAREDNESS FOR FUTURE PANDEMICS[1]

REPORT BY THE COUNCIL FOR TRADE IN GOODS AND ITS SUBSIDIARY BODIES

1   INTRODUCTION.. 1

2   STOCKTAKING IN THE GOODS AREA. 2

2.1   Transparency / Notifications / Voluntary Communications. 2

2.2   Trade Concerns. 5

2.3   Dedicated/Experience‑Sharing Sessions. 5

2.4   Input from External Stakeholders. 8

2.5   Secretariat Information Notes. 9

2.6   Relevant Outcomes. 9

3   LESSONS LEARNED AND CHALLENGES EXPERIENCED IN THE GOODS AREA. 10

3.1   Improving coordination and cooperation at different levels. 10

3.2   Understanding trade-related measures during crises. 10

3.3   Enhancing transparency and experience-sharing at the WTO. 10

3.4   Improving data collection and sharing information. 11

3.5   The role of digitalization. 11

3.6   Identify "essential" goods and their tariff classification. 11

 

1  INTRODUCTION

1.1.  This report has been prepared by the Council for Trade in Goods (Council or CTG) pursuant to paragraph 24 of the "Ministerial Declaration on the WTO Response to the COVID‑19 Pandemic and Preparedness for Future Pandemics" (_WT/MIN(22)/31), which was adopted as part of the MC12 package. This paragraph provides as follows:

24. Relevant WTO bodies[2] will, within their fields of competence, and on the basis of proposals by Members, continue or initiate work as soon as possible, to analyze lessons that have been learned and challenges experienced during the COVID‑19 pandemic. A stocktaking exercise will be taken of the work by WTO bodies under this declaration yearly at the General Council until the end of 2024, based on the reports of those relevant bodies.

1.2.  On 22 June 2022, the Secretariat issued a report on the "WTO Secretariat's Work in the Context of the COVID‑19 Pandemic" (_WT/MIN(22)/34).

1.3.  In September and early October 2022, following MC12, the Chairperson of the CTG consulted bilaterally with Members on how they wished to implement the different outcomes of MC12, including on the WTO response to the Pandemic. At an informal meeting of the Council that took place on 14 October 2022, the Chairperson reported on his consultations (_JOB/CTG/16) and, on this issue, noted that, while some Members had considered that it would be useful to engage in technical discussions of a horizontal nature, in particular because the CTG oversaw the work of the five Committees mentioned in the footnote to paragraph 24, other Members had found it premature to engage in such discussions.

1.4.  Since Members had expressed an interest at that meeting to better understand the work that had been undertaken in the aforementioned bodies[3], on 25 October 2022, the Chairperson of the CTG requested the 14 Chairpersons of the CTG's subsidiary bodies to prepare reports, under their own responsibility and with the assistance of the Secretariat, on the WTO response to the Pandemic and the current functioning of their Committees.[4] In addition, the Chairperson of the CTG also prepared his own reports on this issue. The reports listed in Annex 1 were discussed by Members at the informal meeting of the Council that took place on 31 January 2023.

1.5.  This report compiles information on the work undertaken by the CTG and its 14 subsidiary bodies[5] between the years 2020 and 2023 concerning their response to the COVID‑19 pandemic and preparedness for future pandemics. It is largely based on the reports that were prepared by the Chairpersons of the CTG's subsidiary bodies, but also includes new developments in those bodies up until July 2023.



[1] Report adopted at the formal meeting of the Council for Trade in Goods of 30 November 2023.

[2] Footnote 1 (original): Relevant WTO bodies include the Council for Trade in Goods or its subsidiary bodies (including the Committee on Trade Facilitation, the Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade, the Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures, the Committee on Market Access, and the Committee on Agriculture), Trade Policy Review Body, Council for Trade in Services or its relevant subsidiary bodies, Council for Trade‑Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, Committee on Trade and Development, Working Group on Trade and Technology Transfer and Working Group on Trade, Debt and Finance.

[3] See document JOB/CTG/17.

[4] See document JOB/CTG/18.

[5] The CTG's 14 subsidiary bodies are the Committee on Agriculture (COA), the Committee on Anti‑Dumping Practices (ADP), the Committee on Customs Valuation (CCV), the Committee on Import Licensing (IL), the Committee on Market Access (CMA), the Committee on Rules of Origin (ROO), the Committee on Safeguards (SG), the Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS), the Committee on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (SCM), the Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), the Committee on Trade Facilitation (CTF), the Committee on Trade‑Related Investment Measures (TRIMs), the Working Party on State Trading Enterprises (WPSTE), and the Committee of Participants on the Expansion of Trade in Information Technology Products (ITA).