DRAFT

REPORT (2018) OF THE Working group on trade and transfer

of technology TO THE GENERAL COUNCIL

1.     introduction

1.1.  Ministers agreed, at the Fourth Ministerial Conference in Doha in November 2001, to "an examination, in a Working Group under the auspices of the General Council, of the relationship between trade and transfer of technology, and of any possible recommendations on steps that might be taken within the mandate of the WTO to increase flows of technology to developing countries".^[1] Since then, the Working Group has reported on its work at each WTO Ministerial Meeting. The last such report was made at the Nairobi Ministerial Conference in 2015. Subsequently, the Ministers had time and again reaffirmed their commitment to advance the work of the Working Group and instructed the General Council to further report to the Ministerial Sessions.