Mr Chairman,
Ladies and Gentlemen

As always I am happy to participate at this 56th session of the Trade and Development Board of UNCTAD, which is now a standing item in my agenda.

At last year's 55th session, I began my remarks by noting that I had hoped to report to you that we had successfully concluded negotiations on agricultural and industrial modalities to move on to the final phase of the Doha negotiations. In a few minutes I will give you an overview of where things stand in the DDA negotiations one year later, and my own sense of what is required to conclude.

But first, allow me to address the context in which these negotiations are taking place, and in particular the crisis. This has been the first crisis of a truly global nature; a crisis which has severely affected international trade.

Big or small economies, ranging from OECD economies to single commodity economies in the Caribbean, the effect has been devastating. Of course, while no economy has been spared, it is developing countries, particularly the least developed amongst them that have more acutely felt its full impact. These are countries whose ability to the fight the crisis is more limited, given their limited financial resources — they cannot afford multi billion dollar stimulus packages to bail out struggling enterprises — and therefore are very much at the mercy of the global economic system for their recovery.

The family of the International Organisations, and we in the WTO, have taken steps to help minimise the impact of the crisis, bearing in mind the high trade dependence of many developing countries economies.

First, we have worked to keep trade flowing, by mobilising efforts into trade finance; Second, we have helped Members fight against protectionist pressures by ensuring transparency in the measures taken by them to respond to the crisis. Thirdly, we have continued to mobilise international support towards developing countries to boost their productive and trade capacity through increased aid for trade.

On all this areas we have partnered with other International Organisations, chief among them UNCTAD and the ITC, but also within the UN Joint Crisis Initiative. If this is the first ever global economic crisis, we will not find he right exit strategy without coordination, both at the level of the International Organisations, as well as, or may I say primarily at the level of the Members of these organisations.

Let me first address trade finance, which was severely hit as a result of the liquidity crunch. Trade finance as you know is the credit system that oils international trade and was also a casualty of the financial explosion.

In order to improve both availability and affordability of trade finance we have been actively engaging all relevant partners including commercial banks, export credit agencies and multilateral development banks to develop rapid responses. This effort is paying off. One of the main decisions taken by the London G20 summit was a commitment to make available $250 billion towards trade finance support among other initiatives to influence this package. Under the leadership of the World Bank IFC, a Global Trade liquidity Program was launched bringing together commercial banks and regional development banks. These are tangible responses to the challenges developing countries are facing as a result of this crisis.

Yesterday, I convened a meeting of the WTO expert group on trade finance gathering all operators in this market. The picture that emerges is one where situation is starting to stabilise, both in terms of prices as well as in availability of liquidity, even if we are not yet at full recovery level and even if SMEs, smaller banks and low income countries are still in dire need of trade finance. We need to keep an eye on trade finance to pave the way for a more sustained market in the medium to long term.

Let me now turn to the monitoring of trade and trade related measures which our Members have taken in the crisis. Since the beginning of this crisis we have produced quarterly reports for our Members as a tool to enhance transparency but also to help them to fight the inevitable domestic protectionist pressures.

At the request of the G20 in London we have also recently published the latest such report on trade and investment measures, this time in cooperation with UNCTAD, whose work I would like to publicly praise today, the OECD and the IMF. Yet another signal that the family of International Organisation can work together and rise to the challenge.

The picture from these reports is that Members have refrained from using the kind of high intensity protectionism which we saw in the 30,s. But it is also clear that there has been an accumulation of lower intensity measures which risk creating “sand in the gears” of international trade that will inevitably trigger countermeasures — one need only look at recent evidence - and will retard the global recovery. It is time Members, starting with the G20 meeting in Pittsburgh at the end of the month, start thinking about rolling these measures back as the economy seems to start an upward swing.

Let me now turn to Aid for Trade, where we have also focussed our efforts on continuing to mobilise increased and predictable funds. In July this year, we held the second WTO global Aid for Trade review with the participation of all our partners and in the presence of the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon.

Among the highlights of this review was the confirmation that trade is being prioritised more clearly by developing countries in their development strategies, that donors are offering more and better Aid for Trade and new partners are becoming engaged in South-South cooperation. Furthermore, the review also highlighted the fact that the allocation of more Aid for Trade was being achieved without diverting resources from other development priorities such as health, education or environment.

The review also highlighted some of the key priorities going forward on aid for trade and these include enhancing the regional dimension of aid for trade, enhancing the role and contribution of the private sector, devoting more resources towards enhancing our capacity to evaluate the impact of aid for trade and continued mobilisation of additional resources, in particular looking beyond 2010. On this last point, I am happy to note that some donors have already given us a clear signal of their intention to scale up their aid for trade in the post 2010 period.

We count on UNCTAD and also on the ITC to cooperate in this endeavour and to help collectively bring this agenda forward. Investing in productive capacity is key to helping developing countries exit the crisis.

Last but not least, let me share with you the state of play in the DDA negotiations.

At the beginning of September, India hosted a successful gathering of trade ministers aimed at reviewing the state of play in the negotiations and providing the impetus that would bring the negotiators back to the table in Geneva with their pens full of fresh ink.

At the meeting Members unanimously reaffirmed their commitment to conclude the negotiations by 2010, given the role that they see trade play in the recovery of their economies.

As a concrete step, ministers in Delhi instructed their senior officials to meet here in Geneva beginning this past Monday to design and start implementing a roadmap for filling the gaps left remaining from last July.

These consultations are taking place in all the negotiating groups and will consider all outstanding issues across the board. I hope that next Tuesday when the entire Membership meets we will have a compass to guide the negotiations over the coming months, so that we can wrap them up in 2010.

As I said on numerous occasions, what is outstanding in the DDA negotiations is doable and a deal is within reach, but to get there, we still need a translation of the current global political support into tangible negotiating moves.

Leaders of the G20 meeting in Pittsburgh will have the opportunity to throw their weight behind a Doha Development deal. Just as they will have a historic occasion to show common resolve to address another global challenge confronting the world, climate change. Leadership is about responsibility. Failure to act will be hard felt by the entire international community. The G20 does not decide for the world, but it can show leadership and send a signal. Let's hope that on these two pressing global challenges the smoke in Pittsburgh is white.

Thank you