Latin American countries enhance their capabilities in market access and trade facilitation
San Jose, Costa Rica, 14 October 2015 (IICA). Government officials from 19 Latin American countries acquired new expertise in market access and trade facilitation, thanks to a workshop in Costa Rica organized by the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture (IICA), the World Trade Organization (WTO), and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB).
The 49 participants in the meeting, which was held from 6-8 October at IICA Headquarters, learned about multilateral standards, concepts regarding tariffs, lists of concessions and tariff negotiations, and familiarized themselves with the WTO databases on tariffs and trade.
“Activities such as this help us to improve trade, understand and apply international trade standards better, and construct a knowledge network to facilitate access to information and enable us to advise the authorities of our countries about ways of achieving increasingly fairer and more transparent trade that is better for agriculture,” commented the Director General of the Institute, Víctor M. Villalobos, during the opening of the event.
General information was also presented about the provisions and implementation of WTO agreements governing rules of origin, customs valuation, import licensing procedures, and trade facilitation.
Counsellor Alejandro Gamboa of the WTO’s Market Access Division, Roberta Lascari, a trade policy analyst with the same division, and statistics official Thomas Verbeet, who works for the integrated database unit of the WTO’s Economic Research and Statistics Division, facilitated the training event.
“Government officials in Latin America need to be trained properly to meet the challenges they face in relation to issues such as market access and growth, for the benefit of their peoples. This will also enable them to play a bigger and more active role in international trade negotiations, especially given the latter’s importance and significant impact on the WTO negotiations,” Gamboa pointed out.
The expert emphasized the proliferation of different trade agreements in the region, the advantages they have enjoyed, and the difficulties faced in implementing and utilizing them properly.
The participants also learned how they could improve their countries’ engagement with the multilateral trade system, and shared experiences regarding the situation of other Latin American countries.
“Our objective is to facilitate tools to support regional integration and trade facilitation, as well as the development of infrastructure with a regional perspective, a key aspect of regional integration and global competitiveness for Latin America and the Caribbean,” explained Cinthya Alfaro of the Trade and Investment Unit of the IDB’s Trade and Integration Sector, based in Costa Rica.
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