The work programme, which was developed on the basis of consultations held by the Chair, Ambassador Roberto Zapata Barradas (Mexico), and a meeting of the Negotiating Group on 11 April, provides for multi-day meeting clusters, each organized around a theme, in May, June and July. Each meeting cluster will include technical sessions (members' exchange of information and experiences and/or workshops with outside experts), time for bilateral meetings among delegations, focused thematic discussions, and work to continue creating streamlined negotiating texts on issues not included in document TN/RL/W/274/Rev.2, which had been prepared in the run up to MC11.

In the Ministerial Decision, members agreed to continue to engage constructively in fisheries subsidies negotiations with a view to adopting an agreement by the next Ministerial Conference in 2019 on comprehensive and effective disciplines that prohibit certain forms of fisheries subsidies that contribute to overcapacity and overfishing, and eliminate subsidies that contribute to illegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing. Members also recognized that appropriate and effective special and differential treatment for developing country members and least developed country members should be an integral part of these negotiations. The ministerial decision on fisheries subsidies is available here.

At the May cluster, members will focus on subsidies that enhance and/or maintain fishing capacity and subsidies that contribute to overcapacity and overfishing. At the 11-14 June cluster members will focus on subsidies to fishing on overfished stocks, and at the 23-25 July cluster, the theme will be subsidies to illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing. Special and differential treatment for developing members and least developed country (LDC) members as it relates to the theme of each cluster will be taken up in an integrated way in the activities and discussions. The Chair anticipates that before the end of July, the Negotiating Group will elaborate a fisheries subsidies work programme covering the rest of the year.

At the 11 April meeting, the Chair also reported that in his consultations, some delegations had expressed interest in work on other elements of the Rules agenda, in particular trade remedies. He indicated that any member who desired further work in respect of any other element of the Rules agenda only needed to express that desire and indicate the basis on which it wanted the work to be conducted, and that he would provide the opportunities for such issues and proposals to be fully aired in the Group.