WTO Makes Several Appointments

Chuck Zimmerman

World Trade Organization Hong Kong MinisterialA couple of announcements from the World Trade Organization. You know there’s a very important meeting in Hong Kong this December and AgWired hopes to cover it live.

Hong Kong Commerce Secretary elected chair of the Sixth Ministerial Conference

The General Council, on 29 July 2005, elected Mr. John Tsang, Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology of Hong Kong, China, as the chair of the Sixth Ministerial Conference.

Elected vice-chairpersons were: Austria’s Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Labour Dr. Martin Bartenstein; Barbados’ Senior Minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Antoinette Miller; and Nigeria’s Minister of Commerce Idris Waziri.

Meanwhile, the General Council chair Amina Mohamed announced that the new New Zealand ambassador, Crawford Falconer, is the consensus candidate to replace Mr. Tim Groser as chairperson of the agriculture negotiations and the Cotton Sub-Committee from 1 August 2005.

And in another important announcement:

Lamy announces his four Deputy Directors-General

Director-General Designate Pascal Lamy informed the General Council of the four people he has chosen to be his deputy directors-general. Mr. Lamy, who assumes office on 1 September, told the General Council in a statement that he has selected Alejandro Jara of Chile, Valentine Rugwabiza of Rwanda, Harsha Singh of India and Rufus Yerxa of the United States. Their terms of office will begin on 1 October.

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