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With just six months to go, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) is gearing up for its 14th Ministerial Conference (MC14), a crucial event that most members appear indifferent to. Scheduled to take place in Yaoundé, Cameroon, from March 26 to 29, 2026, this conference carries a complex agenda and significant implications for the future of global trade. As the top authority of the WTO, the ministerial conference not only makes decisions but also serves as a platform for promoting and advocating the respective agendas of its members. The persistent fights, disguised as hectic negotiations, make the conference challenging, exciting, and also frustrating, as in most cases, members have failed to reach a deal.
Since the inception of the WTO in 1995, 13 MCs have taken place in various capitals of the member states. The first MC was held in Singapore in December 1996, and the last one was in Abu Dhabi last year. Most of the conferences did not produce optimal outcomes and carried over unfinished talks on some contentious issues for a long time. Again, some talks were abandoned as members agreed that spending energy on those would be a waste of time.
Nevertheless, MCs are considered a significant opportunity to exchange views among global trade partners and advance both offensive and defensive interests by forming issue-based coalitions. While trade ministers or senior trade representatives of the governments attend the meeting to finalise deals on the trade-related issues, generally, some big and powerful countries manoeuvre the talks in these conferences. They are, however, supported by other countries based on their mutual interests. The WTO secretariat, in association with the host country, typically designs a set of formal programs, while the main negotiations occur in a series of closed-door meetings of selected members or in green rooms. In this process, decision-making becomes a tough task. Media people try to cover the critical aspects and development of the conference, while civil society or non-government organisations (NGOs) lobby for pushing and opposing various agendas.
The WTO itself is a product of a decade-long negotiation among countries, a testament to the power of global cooperation. The agreement to set and follow global rules on trade in agriculture, goods, services, and trade-related intellectual property rights, along with the settlement of trade disputes, was a historic moment. The Marrakesh Agreement, as embodied in the Marrakesh Declaration, was signed in Morocco by 123 nations on April 15, 1994, marking the culmination of the eight-year-long Uruguay Round negotiations and the establishment of the WTO.
For the last three decades, members of the WTO have attempted to negotiate deals on various issues to make global trade rules more comprehensive, addressing emerging challenges and updating inadequate existing trade laws. As decisions are typically made by consensus and every member has the power to veto any decision, reaching a deal is quite challenging in the WTO. That's why, during the three decades of its existence, the organisation's members have reached consensus on only two multilateral agreements. The first is the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA), which was finalised in MC9 in Bali, Indonesia, in 2013. The second is the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies (AFS), though the first part, known as Fish-1, was agreed in MC13 in Abu Dhabi.
As reaching a comprehensive agreement is highly time-consuming and requires prolonged negotiations, WTO members now opt for several small packages covering some critical decisions. The failure to conclude the much-talked-about Doha Round, initiated in MC4 in the Qatari capital in 2001, after a decade of futile negotiations, led the majority of members to pursue less ambitious talks and deals. The Doha Round was abandoned informally in MC11, which took place in Buenos Aires in 2017, and the ministerial concluded without any ministerial declaration. It, however, concluded with several ministerial decisions, including those on fisheries subsidies and e-commerce duties, as well as a commitment to continue negotiations in all areas. Some members initiated three plurilateral initiatives on e-commerce, investment facilitation, and Micro, Small, and Medium-Sized Enterprises (MSMEs) in the ministerial. When some WTO members agree to negotiate a deal on an issue among themselves using the WTO platform and do not pursue multilateral talks, it is known as a plurilateral deal.
The slow progress in negotiation and rule-making for global trade through the WTO platform has also disappointed several members, some of whom now believe that the organisation has little relevance. Others, however, argue that despite many drawbacks, the organisation needs to keep going and become more functional through necessary reforms. For the last few years, a call to reform the WTO has grown louder. For instance, the Hinrich Foundation conducted two surveys this year, and the survey respondents overwhelmingly indicated that they feel WTO reform is essential if 'global trade rules and the body's decision-making system are to keep up with a new world of digital services, complex supply chains, and global trade challenges.' The foundation is an Asia-based philanthropic organisation dedicated to advancing mutually beneficial and sustainable global trade.
It is now clear that reform of the organisation will be a key agenda item in the MC14 next year, and without much progress on the topic, there will be no effective outcome of the conference. The main challenge is again reaching consensus on areas of reform and priorities for the work in this connection. Indications are already there that the reform of the WTO may exclude the dispute settlement system, which is a critical pillar of the organisation and has become dysfunctional over the last eight years. In 2017, the Trump administration of the United States (US) first blocked the appointment of new members to the WTO Appellate Body. Since then, the US has continued its objection and on September 26 this year, it blocked a joint proposal to fill the vacancies for the 90th time.
The possible reform of the WTO may focus on curtailing special and differential treatment (S&DT) for developing nations and the principle of a consensus-based decision-making system. The proposed reform is also likely to pursue plurilateral negotiations over multilateral trade talks, and stress the independent and impartial functioning of the WTO Secretariat in Geneva. Things will take shape in the coming days, and areas of reform will be visible by the end of the year. President Trump's tariff war and grudge on the WTO will also make the next ministerial quite challenging. Members like Bangladesh need to watch the progress and also engage in reform talks so that they do not get left behind in the next ministerial conference.