WTA

Qatar Chamber, in partnership with ICC, launched the ICC Business World Trade Agenda, with an aim to mobilise business to provide a practical and forward-looking trade policy agenda that will contribute to economic growth and job creation, moving global trade “Beyond Doha.”

The ICC Business World Trade Agenda was launched in March 2012 at the World Trade Organization (WTO) headquarters in response to calls from WTO members and from G20 leaders for fresh approaches following a 12-year impasse in multilateral trade negotiations.

At the launch, CEOs, senior corporate executives, and representatives of business organizations began defining elements of a world trade agenda, underscoring the private sector’s desire to move global trade talks out of the Doha Development Agenda deadlock.

Through the ICC Business World Trade Agenda, business leaders can contribute to concrete proposals for strengthening the rules-based multilateral trading system, reconfirming that global business is committed to the objectives of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

In the lead up to the ICC World Trade Agenda Summit, hosted by Qatar Chamber on 22 April 2013, the World Trade Agenda initiative organised consultations with CEOs and senior executives in all major regions of the world to gather input and validation of its recommendations. These business priorities were released during the Summit.

The final set of business recommendations were submitted to governments ahead of the next G20 Summit in Russia in September 2013, and the subsequent WTO Ministerial Conference in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2013. The initiative is expected to continue mobilising CEOs around the world to make the case to national governments for this new trade agenda.

Our efforts to push governments to show the political resolve concluded with a historic agreement on 7 December 2013 at the 9th WTO Ministerial Conference (Bali, Indonesia).

ICC and the Qatar Chamber launched WTA to help successfully conclude the round of multilateral trade negotiations that began in Doha, Qatar over a decade ago.

Since the Doha Round was launched,  Qatar Chamber has helped oversee one of the most dynamic and fastest-growing economies in the world, thus giving the Qatar Chamber a unique understanding of the rapidly changing macro-economic conditions that now charaterise the current state of multilateral trade negotiations.

ICC and the Qatar Chamber are committed to mobilising business around the world as one global voice towards one global solution: the ‘Doha Victory’.