WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  RESTRICTED 
TN/TF/M/46 
27 April 2012 
 (12-2240) 
Negotiating Group on Trade Facilitation  
  
 
MINUTES OF THE MEETING 
 
Held in the Centre William Rappard 
from 16-19 April 2012 
 
Chairman:  H.E. Mr. Eduardo Ernesto Sperisen-Yurt (Guatemala) 
 
 1. The Chairman welcomed Members to the meeting of the Negotiating Group. He hoped that 
delegations had had a nice break.  
2. He recalled that the proposed agenda for the session had been circulated in WTO/AIR/3917. 
As delegations would have noticed from the airg ram, the meeting sought to accomplish three main 
tasks. First, it was set to evaluate the current state-of-play, taking stock of the recent progress made. It further aimed at harvesting the c oncrete advances - both in term s of what Members had already 
accomplished over the course of the past few months and the additional headway they would be able 
to make that week - by integrating them into th e Draft Consolidated Negotiating Text. In addition, 
Members would have an opportunity to review the next steps.   
3. The agenda was adopted. 
A. REPORTS BY THE FACILITATORS , CONSIDERATION OF REVISED TEXTS FOR INCLUSION INTO 
THE DRAFT CONSOLIDATED NEGOTIATING TEXT AND REVIEW OF NEXT STEPS  
4. This part of the meeting was conducted in informal mode.  
5. The Negotiating Group took note of the statements made. 
B. A D HOC ATTENDANCE OF RELEVANT INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS , INCLUDING THE 
IMF,  OECD,  UNCTAD,  WCO  AND THE WORLD BANK, AT THE NEXT MEETING OF THE 
NEGOTIATING GROUP  
6. The Chairman suggested inviting relevant inte rnational organizations, including the IMF, 
OECD, UNCTAD, WCO and the World Bank to attend the next formal meeting of the Negotiating 
Group on an ad hoc basis, as provided for in the Work Plan. 
7. It was so agreed. 
C. O THER BUSINESS  
8. The Chair informed Members of an initiative unde rtaken by Mexico and invited the Mexican 
representative to brief delegations on the project.  TN/TF/M/46 
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  9. The representative of Mexico recalled the Chair's invitation for Members to engage in 
activities in parallel to the main negotiations with  a view to improving the negotiating work. He was 
pleased to inform Members of one such initiative.  
10. On 7th March, Mexico had sent an e-mail to al l delegations reporting that throughout a 
discussion process, a number of Spanish speaking Me mbers had identified specific parts of the Draft 
Consolidated Negotiating Text (TN/TF/W/165) where th e Spanish version was not consistent with the 
English version. He had therefore launched an initi ative which sought to ensure that both versions 
were consistent so that Members would have the sa me basis for their discussi ons and to ensure that 
the final texts were consistent am ongst each other to avoid legal prob lems which could otherwise arise 
as all language versions were equally authentic . A group of countries had therefore decided to 
undertake an exercise of review and identificati on of those parts of the text which required 
adjustments. It had been a very positive exercise.  
11. There had been an open-ended invitation to all interested Members and 14 delegations 
actually participated in addition to a considerab le number of delegations expressing their interest 
without being able to attend due to conflicting commitments. The meeting also benefited from the 
presence of the Language Service Division of the WTO. 
12. Work had always been conducted constructiv ely in a business-like way, respecting the 
principle of ensuring that the Spanish version prope rly reflected the current English version. It had 
been made clear that the exercise did not represent a negotiating forum.  It would not change the terms of the negotiation nor would it alter the text in E nglish.  As a result, the group of Spanish speaking 
delegations would be requesting that the correspondi ng adjustments be made to the Spanish version. 
They were grateful to the Chair for his support a nd for the support from the WTO Secretariat  in this 
exercise. 
13. The representative of Chile thanked Mexico for his report on the work that had taken place in 
this area.  It was an example of some of the vari ous tasks that Members had to spend some of their 
time on if they wanted to continue making progress in the trade facilitation negotiations.  As Mexico 
had mentioned, the exercise was not a negotiating fo rum. It was important for there to be a frank 
exchange at a technical level on the best way of re flecting the English text in Spanish since Members 
generally tended to agree on the basis of an Englis h text. Work on this project had been very positive 
and constructive and he urged delegations which ha d not yet been able to pa rticipate to come and send 
in any comments they might have in order to ensu re that Members had an excellent Spanish language 
version of their negotiating text.  
14. The Chair informed Members of a request by  the African Group for a Trade Facilitation 
Seminar to be held in Africa in the Autumn. The Secretariat was working on the organization of the 
seminar, which was meant to be a high-level sym posium.  They were working together with the 
African Group on the organization of this event. Donor s would also be contacted in order to collect 
the necessary funding for this event. 
15. He further reminded the ACP and LDC Groups that 27th April was the deadlin e to register for 
the capital-based officials to par ticipate in the symposium on Trade Facilitation to be held in July. 
16. He then addressed the issue of the dates for th e Negotiating Group's next meeting. In line with 
the Work Plan adopted by Members in January, he proposed for that session to take place from 
9-12 July. This would also be the time for th e second symposium held on response to Members' 
request. Details on objective and structure of both events would be communicated in due course. 
17. It was so agreed.  TN/TF/M/46 
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  18. The representative of Chile announ ced that it was time for him to  say goodbye. He wished to 
thank the Chair for the confidence he had shown in  appointing him as a Facilitator in this phase of 
Members work.  He extended his thanks to those in the Secretariat who had given him much support in this task and to all colleagues as a Facilitator' s job became much easier when one could benefit 
from the kind of co-operation he had enjoyed and th e atmosphere he had felt in the course of the 
meetings. In addition to the professional relationship they had built throughout  their relations, they 
also had a friendship and the pleasure of working t ogether on the same project and to build something 
together.  That was the most memorable part he would take back home to Chile.  It had been a 
pleasure to be part of an overall large project that  was moving forward, taking determined steps in the 
right direction so that Members reached a good agreement.   
19. The Negotiating Group took note of the statements made. 
20. The meeting was adjourned. 
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