ICS called for maritime transport to be prioritised in multilateral trade negotiations ahead of high-level WTO meetings to take place this week.
While the 12th Ministerial Conference has been indefinitely postponed due to the Omicron variant, a schedule of meetings of WTO Ministers and governments will go ahead.
Critical issues and challenges confronting the multilateral trading system and impacting the global economy will be discussed, including the ongoing impact of COVID-19.
More specifically, in a briefing session with the business community, ahead of the meetings, ICS urged WTO Director General, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, to pay closer attention to maritime transport in WTO trade initiatives and negotiations.
Formal discussions on the liberalisation of maritime transport services at the WTO have been paused for several years and national governments’ commitments towards liberalisation of maritime services in previous negotiations lack legal certainty, “leaving the industry in perpetual limbo.”
Responding to the call by ICS, Dr Okonjo-Iweala, said:
With all the supply chain issues we experienced this year, there is increasing interest in the maritime transport sector, including the underlying issues leading to supply chain bottlenecks
What is more, Dr Okonjo-Iweala added that WTO has met with some of the major shipping companies and next year it plans to “hold a comprehensive dialogue with the entire sector, to gain a better understanding of these issues, what their difficulties were and what can be done to address it.”
For his part, Guy Platten, Secretary General at ICS, commented that:
We are very encouraged by Dr Okonjo-Iweala’s message to the shipping industry at this meeting. There are many issues that unite ICS and the WTO, as the gatekeeper of free trade throughout the world, but none more so than our shared values and principles of open and unimpeded access to international markets
Recently, after the conclusion of the IMO’s MEPC 77, ICS expressed its disappointment “that the words and commitments made by governments at COP26 have not yet been translated into action.”
More specifically, ICS Secretary General, Guy Platten, stated that MEPC 77 missed the opportunity to take forward a range of GHG reduction measures which would accelerate the development of zero emissions ships “that are urgently needed at scale to decarbonise our sector. It’s almost as if COP 26 never happened.”
Governments can’t keep kicking the can down the road; every delay moves us further away from reaching pressing climate goals. We will continue to work with governments to agree to the suite of measures which the industry has proposed, including the 5 billion dollar R&D fund as an immediate step to be followed by a levy based carbon price for shipping
