Geneva, March 7 (Xinhua) — The Director General of the World Trade Organization, Ivira, stated on the 6th that South South trade is becoming an important driving force for global trade growth, and the WTO highly appreciates China’s policy measures to promote South South cooperation.
On the same day, the World Trade Organization held the 8th South South Dialogue on China’s Least Developed Countries and Development in Geneva, Switzerland. Ivira, along with ambassadors from China, South Africa, India and about 60 ambassadors and representatives from the least developed members, attended the meeting. The attending representatives highly appreciate China’s pragmatic measures in supporting South South cooperation and helping the least developed countries integrate into the global value chain within the framework of the World Trade Organization.
Ivira pointed out that in the context of trade turbulence, South South trade is becoming an important driving force for global trade growth, with over 50% of developing countries’ exports flowing to other developing countries. The proportion of South South trade has increased from about 10% in 1995 to about 25% currently.
Ivira said that by 2024, the bilateral trade volume between China and Africa has exceeded 290 billion US dollars, and China’s investment in Africa has reached about 42 billion US dollars. Under the initiative of jointly building the “the Belt and Road”, Chinese investment has gradually expanded from infrastructure to medicine, food processing, education, water resources, renewable energy and other fields.
Ivira stated that in the context of intensifying global geopolitical conflicts and rising economic uncertainty, a stable and predictable multilateral trading system is particularly important. The World Trade Organization is an important tool to assist the least developed countries in conducting trade, achieving growth and development. One of the important goals of WTO reform is to enhance the ability of the least developed countries to seize trade and development opportunities.
China’s Permanent Representative to the World Trade Organization, Li Yongzhao, stated that the current multilateral trading system is facing severe challenges from unilateralism. China has put forward global development initiatives and global governance initiatives, and supports strengthening multilateralism and global economic governance through WTO reform. China supports the least developed countries in enhancing their trade capacity through multilateral and bilateral cooperation such as trade preferences, investment cooperation, and capacity building. China will continue to expand market opening, deepen trade and investment cooperation with the least developed countries, and promote more practical results in South South cooperation.