AMMAN - A meeting which included the heads and representatives of the Permanent Mission of the League of Arab States to the United Nations was held in Geneva on Thursday in attendance of the Representative of the Arab League and the Chief Advisor of the World Trade Organization (WTO).
The meeting was held under the invitation and sponsorship of Talal Abu-Ghazaleh International (TAGI) and the Centre for Applied Studies in International Negotiations (CASIN) to announce the establishment of the Arab Centre for Multilateral Trade Capacity Building.
Abu-Ghazaleh, Chairman of TAGI, presented to the attendees an illustration on the role of the Center and its objectives that are focused on developing comprehensive Arab participation in the international multilateral trade system.
Several representatives from the Permanent Mission of the League of Arab States presented constructive recommendations to develop the program's ideas, confirming that this initative has come at the right time and that both ministries and governmental institutions concerned with multilateral trade negotiations are in need of such a program, and expressing their unconditional support to the project.
Abu-Ghazaleh made clear that the Center will resume its work through several programs and will hold its first program in Geneva for training the trainers over the span of two weeks and in two phases. Programs will be delivered in Arabic. TAGI will also translate into Arabic the most prominent of programs that CASIN delivered for global governments in the past twenty years. Moreover, TAGI will grant the necessary support and required expertise that CASIN experts will need for preparing programs that are suitable to the requirements of the Arab world.
The representatives presented the following recommendations to be adopted during the preparation process of the program which included:
- Regionalizing the program and its incorporation into national curriculums, while making sure that its central topics are built on Arab common interests whereby it can cover the related objectives of the Arab Free Trade Zone project.
- The preparation of a specialized program on WTO membership negotiations. Although many Arab countries have already surpassed this stage, there are other countries that are still on the path of negotiating membership.
- Submitting a recommendation to confirm that programs, whether regional or local, meet the needs of every state.
- A recommendation that the program includes the Academia program which is an MSc in Business Management in Global Trade which will be organized in cooperation with the WTO and other major universities.
Arab diplomats confirmed the necessity of the program being delivered in Arabic and for it to be less theory-based and more practical-based. This is to be done through addressing potential obstacles during the preparation process of the program, especially in what is related to obstacles to comply local legislations with international trade treaties.
On the subject of funding, Abu-Ghazaleh said that in addition to funding from Arab governments, Arab funding institutions should also play a role in providing funding to the program aside from international efforts which were established to provide the necessary funding to the program.
At the end of the meeting, the representatives thanked Abu-Ghazaleh for this profit-aiming initiative "which reflects a true partnership between an Arab and international institution that works for the benefit of the Arab economy."