RESTRICTED  
  
WT/WGTDF/M/3 3 
 
26 January  2017 
(17-0508) Page: 1/1 
Working Group on Trade, Debt a nd Finance   
 
REPO RT OF THE MEETING OF  20 OCTOBER 2016  
1.1.  The thirty -fourth  meeting of the Working Group on Trade, Debt and Finance (WGTDF) was 
held on 20 October  2016 under the Chairmanship of Ambassador Atanas Paparisov (Bulgaria). In 
his introductory remarks, he indicat ed that the Working Group's input at the May meeting had 
been important for the Director -General in follow -up on his proposals laid out in his document 
"Trade Finance and SMEs". In May, delegations had expressed the wish to further discuss new 
methods of f inancing trade, such as supply chain financing and digital trade, and ways in which 
Micro and Small and Medium sized -enterprises (MSMEs) could be covered by the discussions o n 
trade finance and proposals. Since then, two sessions of the 2016 Public Forum h ave been 
dedicated to trade finance, one organized by the European Bank for Reconstruction Development 
(EBRD) , and the other organized by a group of bankers and trade finance insurers  on long term 
trade finance .  
1.2.  The Secretariat had also circulated a progr ess report, in WTO Document WT/WGTDF/W/82. 
The 2016 Asian Development Bank's global trade finance gap survey had shown that global trade 
finance gaps remained large (US$  1.6 trillion in 2015 despite the fall in trade in US dollar value, 
against US$  1.4 tri llion in 2014). They affected dispr oportionally SMEs. Globally, 58 per cent  of 
trade finance requests by SMEs to banks had been rejected, against 10  per cent  for multinational 
companies. Half of SMEs did not seek alternative funding, either because of the absence of it (in 
many develop ing countries), unawareness (70 per cent  of surveyed SMEs are unaware of digital 
finance) and other reasons. Trade finance gaps existed in all continents, including in developing 
Asia, Europe, Africa, Latin America, and the Pa cific.  
1.3.  The Secretariat also provided an update on the Director -General's follow -up meetings with 
heads of partner institutions, such as the International Trade Finance Corporation (Islamic 
Development Bank Group), and the International Finance Corporation  (IFC, part of the World Bank 
Group). The Director -General and the Chief Executive Officer aimed at organizing a high -level 
round table on the topic of trade finance and SMEs at the 2017 spring meetings of the IMF and 
World Bank, based on good, solid analy sis. The issue of withdrawal by large banks from many 
developing countries, through the termination of correspondent banking relationship s had been 
discussed by the Director General, with a focus on its impact on the smaller traders.  
1.4.  Based on this update,  several Members  took the floor and expressed their support to these 
advocacy efforts, bearing in mind the limitations of the WTO's mandate. They added their v oices to 
other delegations who  had expressed their views at the May meeting. As a result, delegat ions 
agreed, as confirmed in the Annual Report of the Working Group (WT/WGTDF/ 15), to continue to 
discuss the topic of trade finance and SMEs in the year 2017. No other topic had been raised by 
delegations for possible future submission.  
 
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