Central Department of WTO
Ministry of Foreign Trade
Cairo, Egypt
Why a Central Department of WTO?
Egypt was a contracting party to the GATT since 1970 and has been a member of the World Trade Organization since June 30, 1995. During the Uruguay Round negotiations (1986-1994), which concluded with the establishment of the World Trade Organization, a Permanent National Committee for WTO Negotiations existed that coordinated the country position. That experience has taught us that a complete and highly specialized central department, in collaboration with a national committee on negotiations, should coordinate these highly complex negotiations, follow-up on existing commitments, communicate with public and private sectors to involve them in the negotiations process, and overall make sure that Egypt’s interests are promoted in the WTO.
Ministerial Decree No. 411 of 2002 officially created the Central Department of WTO in the Ministry of Foreign Trade as the main coordinating body for all issues related to the WTO. Since then, we have been hard at work, first to get organized so as to be able to handle the numerous topics covered by the WTO, including agriculture, services, non-agriculture market access, intellectual property rights, textiles and clothing, sanitary and phytosanitary measures, technical barriers to trade, customs valuation, etc., and second to interact with public and private sectors so as to formulate negotiating positions that reflect the views of all stakeholders and promote national interests. In this regard, CD/WTO acts as the Secretariat to the High National Committee on the Doha Negotiations (HNC), which formulates the Egyptian position in all WTO negotiations.
H.E. Dr. Youssef Boutros Ghali, Minister of Foreign Trade (center),
Mr. Waleed El-Nozahy, CD/WTO (left), and Ms. Anne Aarnes, USAID (right)
The Doha Ministerial Conference in November 2001 launched a new round of negotiations, known as the Doha Development Agenda, which, among other things, set deadlines for the “built-in agenda” negotiations (agriculture and services), and launched negotiations in non-agriculture market access, geographical indicators (to extend higher level protection currently provided wine and spirits to other products), aspects of trade and environment, trade and investment, trade and competition policy, transparency in government procurement, and trade facilitation.
Through this website, we hope to keep primarily the Egyptian public aware of what the CD/WTO is doing to ensure that Egypt derives maximum benefits from its WTO membership. In doing so, we will try to make as much information as possible available in Arabic. For your convenience, we also provide information on the WTO itself (assembled from the WTO’s own website, which we would encourage you to visit), existing information on Egypt’s participation in the WTO (e.g. schedules of commitments, trade policy review, disputes involving Egypt, and notifications), as well as relevant trade-related research and related links.
We would encourage you to please provide us with your feedback, whether on CD/WTO activities or on the website itself, so that we may be able to serve the Egyptian public better.
As much of the WTO background information on this website is borrowed from the WTO website, we wish to thank the WTO secretariat for their assistance and would encourage the reader to consult the WTO website for more ample details on the WTO.
CD/WTO at a Glance
- The mission of the Central Department of WTO, located at the Ministry of Foreign Trade, is to provide leadership in coordinating and integrating all issues related to Egypt’s full and effective participation in the WTO, and in the process derive maximum economic and social benefits for Egyptians.
- In pursuance of its mission, the CD/WTO strives to achieve the following key objectives:
- Coordinate all WTO related matters for Egypt
- Integrate Egypt Fully into WTO to Derive Maximum Benefits and Safeguard National Economic, Security and Social Interests
- Facilitate Compliance with WTO Membership Related Obligations
- Develop Institutional Capabilities Within CD/WTO
- CD/WTO strives to achieve the following goals in the next two/three years:
- Establish mechanisms for coordination, through the HNC and other means, with ministries, private sector, NGOs, and other external agencies involved in WTO related activities
- Create awareness among exporters, importers, manufacturers, producers, and general business community, regarding Egypt’s rights and obligations under the WTO agreements and functioning of the Central Department of WTO
- Establish CD/WTO institutional framework (structure, management practices, staffing, systems, logistics, etc.) to ensure long term effective performance compatible with objectives outlined above
- Develop and implement work plans to enable staff to participate in preparing, presenting and following up Egypt’s participation in ongoing WTO negotiations in: agriculture, services, non-agricultural market access, WTO rules, Singapore issues, Doha round, environment, etc.
- The CD/WTO is a group of dynamic staff committed to maximizing the benefits to Egypt of its participation in the WTO.
- The staff is composed of over 25 highly trained economists, trade specialists, and lawyers fully conversant in the WTO agreements and the WTO negotiation process.
- The CD/WTO staff are broadly organized along eight sub-groups, including:
- WTO rules and dispute settlement
- Competition policy and investment
- Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS), Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), trade and environment
- Agriculture, ministerial conferences, general council, trade negotiations committee
- Trade in services, and technical assistance and training
- Non-agricultural market access, textiles, customs valuation
- Intellectual Property Rights, Information Technology Agreement
- Government procurement and trade facilitation
- The CD/WTO acts as the Secretariat to the High National Committee on the Doha Negotiations.
- The CD/WTO works in collaboration with the Egyptian mission in Geneva to stay informed of all developments at the WTO and to participate in bilateral negotiations with other WTO members.
- The CD/WTO is located on the 3rd floor at the Foreign Trade Policies Sector, Ministry of Foreign Trade, in Shobra Corniche-El-Nile (Cairo).
What is CD/WTO Doing Currently?
- Negotiations are currently ongoing in several WTO aspects, including agriculture, non-agriculture market access, WTO rules, and services. The CD/WTO is coordinating Egypt’s position in each of those discussions, especially in its role as Secretariat for the HNC.
- Services team activities
- The services team held a series of formal group meetings with services professionals starting in summer 2002 to prepare Egypt’s request list to other WTO members in order to improve conditions of Egyptian services exporters in those markets. To improve awareness of WTO rules governing trade in services, the team organized a trade in Services Seminar in October 2002, which was attended by over 150 representatives of government, private sector, trade associations, NGOs, academia, and representatives of foreign embassies. At the same time Egypt received requests from several WTO members to provide them with improved market access and national treatment. Based on those requests and analysis of local service industries, and in coordination with the HNC subcommittee on trade in services, the team will help prepare a draft schedule of commitments. This schedule will reflect areas of services where greater competition is likely to improve services provided to the consumers and to industries that depend on the efficiency and effectiveness of those services to be competitive.
- Services questionnaire
- Trade in services news
- Contact
- Agriculture team activities
- Non-agriculture market access team activities
- WTO rules team activities
- IPR team’s activities
- Competition policy and investment team activities
- Government procurement and trade facilitation team activities
|
