JOINT COMMUNIQUE TO THE NINTH WTO MINISTERIAL CONFERENCE
Antigua & Barbua, Boliva, Cuba, Dominica, Nicaragua, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Lucia and Venezuela
The following communication, dated 5 December 2013, is being circulated at the request of the
Delegation of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.
We, member countries of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America - Peoples’ Trade
Treaty (ALBA – TCP), aspire for the IX Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization
scheduled to be held in Bali, Indonesia from the 3rd to the 6th of November, to achieve concrete
results on the development matters given the fact that the Ministers gathered in Doha, Qatar in
2001, agreed to start new multilateral negotiations on the indispensable condition that particular
interest and needs of the developing member countries of the WTO.
We reiterate that one of our main core beliefs is that trade must be one of the instruments that
ensures the well-being of our peoples. Consequently, we demand the signing of fair and balanced
Agreements.
We believe that the Ministerial Conference is a great opportunity to start to address the
asymmetries in world trade and ensure a fairer participation of the developing countries in the
international trade. The need for compliance with judgments issued by the WTO Dispute
Settlement Body by members, especially when the Injured Party is a small vulnerable economy
and the Offending Party is a developed country, must be addressed in an effort to maintain the
integrity of the World Trade Organization and its respective organs.
We wish to reaffirm our view that the Doha Round negotiations provide the necessary conditions
for trade to be an instrument for social change, not only to create wealth, but also to distribute it
equitably. Trade should be an instrument that goes beyond the human being as a potential
consumer, cares for Mother Earth and points to the need to bring an end to the unsustainable
patterns of consumption and production that characterize today’s world economy.
We are convinced that the Doha Work Program must be kept as the WTO core agenda, and the
lack of result in the Doha agenda does not mean that it reflects and obsolete agenda, like some
claim, but rather the negative of the main developed countries to take on new commitments which
would revert, somehow, the negative effects of the Uruguay round on developing countries.
We are firmly committed in defending multilateralism and we reject the excuse of developed
countries to promote plurilateral approaches to achieve their interests, diminishing the policy
space of the countries of the south, through the establishment of new disciplines with higher
standards and in detriment of the WTO and the unity of developing countries.
We are resolved in rejecting non-transparent and non-inclusive negotiating mechanisms, in order
to impose unbalanced outcomes, in detriment of developing countries.
We emphasize that the agricultural matters, especially the matter related to the trade-distorting
subsidies should be resolved according to the guidelines clearly set out in the Doha Ministerial
Declaration, on the basis of which particular needs and concerns of the developing and least
developed countries must be addressed with priority.
Being committed to our peoples, the Member States of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of
Our America stand in defense of our industrial sectors and jobs, which must not be compromised
by new abusive grants in the framework of the IX WTO Ministerial Conference.
We believe this is a great time to rethink the multilateral trading system on the basis of concepts
such as solidarity, complementarity and fair trade.
We urge all the peoples of the world to mobilize in order to reach a true dimension of development
and bring an end to the existing world economic order which affect the multilateral trading system
and place it to the service of shabby interests.