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India must embrace plurilateral talks on services × The WTO’s latest Joint Services Initiative is more flexible, which will benefit India and help us develop good regulatory practices Selection of the first lady Director-General of the WTO and the new Biden administration in the US will hopefully generate a new momentum at the world trade body. However, one area that seems to be generating momentum of its own, with an expected outcome at the Ministerial Conference later this year, is the Joint Services Initiative (JSI) on Domestic Regulations in Services, seeking to develop and adopt disci...

Former Deputy Directors-General Director-General Roberto Azevêdo appointed four Deputy Directors-General in September 2013: Yonov Frederick Agah of Nigeria, Karl Brauner of Germany, David Shark of the United States and Yi Xiaozhun of China. David Shark served until September 2017 while Frederick Agah, Karl Brauner and Yi Xiaozhun remained in office until March 2021. Alan Wolff of the United States served as Deputy Director-General from September 2017 to March 2021. Four Deputy Directors-General served under Director-General Pascal Lamy from October 2005 to September 2013: Alejandro J...

Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala’s appointment as the director-general of the World Trade Organisation is a step closer to bridging the global gender parity gap. For decades, women, especially those originating from the global South, have fought for representation and inclusiveness in political, economic, and social spaces both on domestic and international levels. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) posits that gender diversity in public institutions is imperative considering that these decision-making bodies create the rules that affect people’s rights, behaviours, a...

There was more than a sense of a spring clean on the shores of Lake Geneva last week, as the World Trade Organization's new director general rolled up her sleeves to begin the long and challenging process of bringing new relevance to a body that has delivered little but disappointment. From the high-water mark of enthusiasm for multilateralism and international trade liberalisation, with the WTO's founding in 1995, the trade body's trajectory...

Hoping for a fairer deal A Nigerian heading the WTO has raised the developing world’s hopes India’s Permanent Representative to the WTO Brajendra Navnit made an interesting comment at the multilateral body’s General Council meeting last month where Nigeria’s Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala was elected as the Director General by consensus. He cited Mahatma Gandhi’s talisman exhorting people who are in doubt to think whether the action they are contemplating would help the poor and urged the new DG to apply this test whenever she was seized by doubt over crucial issues. Having launched his first...