As trade ministers prepare for the Fourteenth WTO Ministerial Conference (MC14) in Yaoundé, Cameroon this week, there is no shortage of commentary on the challenges facing the multilateral trading system and the need for reform. 

While much attention is on cascading geopolitical tensions, governments must not lose sight of the fact that MC14 is being held at a time when the world is failing to deliver on the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the scale and speed required. Alongside the mounting challenges of stark economic inequalities, food insecurity and hunger in many parts of the world, the international community collectively faces an extraordinary set of environmental crises—climate change, nature loss, and pollution—which threaten the stability, resilience, and prosperity of economies and communities everywhere, but especially the world's poorest and most vulnerable. 

As the ministerial conference gathers on the African continent for only the second time in 30 years, it is vital that members step up their focus on the need for the WTO and the reform agenda to respond more explicitly, proactively, and swiftly to sustainable development challenges and opportunities—economic, social, and environmental.

High on the agenda for ministers must also be a course-correction in the ongoing WTO reform agenda to address the distinct and concerning lack of focus on sustainable development. To underline that message, a diverse group of stakeholders—from business, civil society, and research communities—have issued a call for ministers to embed sustainability as an anchor for the WTO reform agenda, taking forward the objective of sustainable development enshrined in the preamble to the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the WTO. Critically, this multi-stakeholder statement highlights that the outside world is watching and many will judge the WTO’s relevance and credibility on how it responds to urgent sustainability priorities.

A strong ministerial-level voice will also be needed to step up the commitment to enhanced international cooperation on trade and environment. At MC14, ministers should seize the opportunity to strengthen the positive progress of the past few years, providing vital political impetus for collective action and concrete outcomes that address global environmental challenges in ways that are ambitious, effective, and just.

Today, the broad majority of WTO members share a conviction that environment and trade issues require sustained attention and stronger, more inclusive international cooperation. At MC14, ministers must step forward from their engagements on environmental priorities at previous ministerial conferences.

At MC13 in 2024, despite the marked and disappointing absence of any multilateral outcomes explicitly focused on environmental priorities, the majority of WTO members signalled their readiness to engage in fostering more effective cooperation on environment and trade at the WTO. A wide range of ministerial statements issued at MC13 by a range of regional and political groupings, individual WTO members, and on behalf of the three member-led WTO initiatives on environment demonstrated the growing nuance of discussion, moving beyond long-standing North-South stand-offs on trade and environment and toward a focus on where there is scope for a proactive, positive trade contribution. Statements from the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States, the Pacific Group, and the LDC group, along with those of a range of Latin American countries, a cross-regional group of over 70 developing countries, and the Coalition of Trade Ministers on Climate, demonstrate the readiness of a broad diversity of WTO members to explore opportunities for enhanced trade-related cooperation on global environmental challenges. 

Since MC13, these promising dynamics have enabled WTO members to revitalize multilateral deliberations in the WTO's Committee on Trade and Environment (CTE). Moreover, environmental considerations and priorities arise in a broad range of WTO councils and bodies—ranging from those responsible for goods, services, and intellectual property; to those covering agriculture, development, and technical barriers to trade; and those responsible for trade and technology transfer, and on trade, debt, and finance. 

Across these fora, WTO members have demonstrated their interest in sharing national experiences, boosting transparency, discussing best practices, producing guidance, and generating concrete proposals. To be sure, there are important tensions to be addressed on a range of trade and environment matters, but what is important is that members are now engaged in active, constructive dialogue—building shared understandings, identifying challenges and opportunities, and looking for pathways for trade-related cooperation to address specific environmental challenges and drive positive environmental outcomes in ways that support wider sustainable development priorities effectively and fairly. Here, developing countries have clearly voiced their interest in exploring approaches that generate positive incentives and support wider goals of economic transformation and diversification, green industrialization, and competitiveness. .

This revived interest and, critically, the emerging trust and good will, must not be squandered.

In good news, there are a number of specific opportunities at MC14 to consolidate existing collaboration and momentum on sustainability agendas at the WTO. 

Ministers will be celebrating the entry into force of the Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies (Fish 1)—the first WTO agreement with environmental protection at its core. MC14 is an essential moment for minsters to inject high-level commitment to full implementation of Fish 1 and provide a clear, time-bound instruction to advance drifting negotiations, focused on the critical outstanding issue of subsidies that contribute to overcapacity and overfishing (Fish 2). 

Building on much-needed dialogue on sustainable agriculture over the past year, ministers should also seize the proposal for a Ministerial Decision to advance an informal, open-ended, member-led Dialogue on Emerging Agricultural Trade issues at the WTO, with a view to supporting well-functioning agricultural markets, taking into account sustainable development and the diversity of agricultural systems, production conditions, and development needs..

MC14 is also an opportunity for ministers to affirm their commitment to stepping up collaborative efforts in the CTE, harnessing the unprecedented level of engagement since MC13. Over the past two years, for instance, a broad diversity of members has shared significant proposals for enhanced cooperation on sustainable agriculture, technology transfer, and trade measures with climate objectives, providing a foundation for work that should be further advanced in the near term.

MC14 is also a moment to shine a spotlight on the positive work of three member-led initiatives at the WTO on environmental sustainability, plastic pollution, and fossil fuel subsidy reform. The Dialogue on Plastics Pollution (DPP), which now brings together 83 WTO members, will issue a joint Ministerial Statement highlighting specific areas in which they will pursue international cooperation on the trade dimensions of plastic pollution. The co-sponsors of the Fossil Fuel Subsidy Reform (FFSR) initiative are also expected to issue a ministerial statement reporting on activities undertaken since MC13 and reaffirming its work programme.

In the lead up to MC14, the co-convenors of the Trade and Environmental Sustainability Structured Discussions (TESSD), issued a significant outcome package from TESSD’s first five years of work. At MC14, ministers should signal their support for the Ministerial Statement of TESSD's co-convenors, Canada and Costa Rica, highlighting the initiative's vital function as a space for informal exploration of collaborative options and new approaches, and an incubator and catalyst for connecting the dots between sustainability discussions underway across a range of WTO processes and in the context of WTO reform.

Alongside MC14, the Coalition of Trade Ministers on Climate will hold its third ministerial meeting and is expected to issue a joint communiqué highlighting the commitment of the coalition's diverse membership of more than 60 trade ministers to deepen engagement at the WTO on the nexus of climate, trade, and sustainable development, including on sustainable agriculture, technology transfer and trade-related climate measures.

In short, there is a tremendous range of activity to be consolidated and advanced at MC14.

For ministers, top of the agenda at MC14 will be the WTO reform agenda, where the hope is that ministers will forge a forward-looking roadmap to advance discussions. The issues on the table are vast, ranging from governance (institutional issues), fairness (level playing field), and “issues of our time.”

Disappointing, however, is that sustainable development issues—from development to climate change—have not been front and centre as they should be. No doubt, ministers have their work cut out to agree on ways forward on this complex set of issues; they face an extraordinarily unstable trade landscape and urgent and political challenges requiring careful diplomacy.

But the stark backdrop is that social, economic, and environmental crises and risks remain immediate, real, consequential, and intensifying: this is no time for neglecting sustainability priorities or postponing action until the political landscape is easier. It is a time for ministers individually—and ideally collectively—to reaffirm the shared purpose that should anchor their work together at the WTO and in the reform agenda; the WTO’s foundational commitment to advancing sustainable development.

The WTO is at a turning point. The reform agenda must be seized as a critical opportunity to rethink and be creative—a time for leaders to fix their eyes on the wider, longer-term horizon and to have the courage to bolster the foundations of a WTO fit for the future we need. Looking ahead, a key question for all ministers and delegations should be: how can we harness discussions on the reform agenda to reshape the WTO to better reflect and advance sustainable development objectives across its core functions, activities, and rules.

As we look toward MC14 and beyond, WTO reform cannot be a project for trade officials alone. To push governments to step up and deliver enhanced cooperation on sustainability priorities, robust stakeholder engagement will be vital. The MC14 multi-stakeholder statement highlights that demand and willingness to engage is there, from business, civil society, and the research communities alike. Moreover, the statement serves as a clear reminder of the need for faster concrete outcomes and action on the cooperative trade frameworks and incentives urgently required for economic resilience, stability, and prosperity, just transitions, and to support a thriving planet on which all economies and human well-being everywhere rely.

The Yaoundé ministerial conference must serve to consolidate political commitment to a reform roadmap where sustainable development is recognized as central to the future of the multilateral trading system. Trade ministers must seize the opportunity at MC14 to reaffirm their commitment to a WTO that supports sustainable development and a reform agenda fit for that purpose. 

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Carolyn Deere Birkbeck is Founder and Executive Director, Forum on Trade, Environment, and the SDGs.

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Synergies is an online platform featuring expert commentary and opinions curated by TESS. We foster dialogue and incubate ideas on how to shape a global trading system that effectively addresses global environmental crises and advances sustainable development. Synergies draws on perspectives from leading experts and practitioners across policy communities from around the world. We cultivate solutions-oriented policy analysis for a sustainable future.

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