. /.  RESTRICTED  WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  TN/CTD/M/36 
24 August 2009 
 
 (09-4001) 
Committee on Trade and Development 
Thirty-Sixth Special Session  
 
 
 
NOTE ON THE MEETING OF 23 JULY 2009 
 
Chairman:  Ambassador Thawat chai Sophastienphong (Thailand) 
 
 
A. ADOPTION OF THE AGENDA .........................................................................................................1  
B. REPORTING ON WORK UNDERTAKE N OVER THE PAST FEW MONTHS ...........................................1  
C. OTHER BUSINESS .........................................................................................................................2  
 
A. ADOPTION OF THE AGENDA  
1. The draft agenda for the meeting as contai ned in airgram WTO/AIR/3405 of 10 July 2009 
was adopted.   
B. REPORTING ON WORK UNDERTAKE N OVER THE PAST FEW MONTHS  
2. The Chairman  said that the meeting had been held to update the wider Membership on the 
work carried out since he had last reported to Memb ers in March 2009.  He recalled that at the March 
meeting, he had indicated that while he had in itially intended to continue work on both the 
Agreement-specific proposals and the Monitoring Mech anism, he had decided, at the beginning of the 
year, to begin by concentrating on the Monitoring M echanism.  As a result, work in 2009 had been 
focusing on the elements of a Monitoring Mechanism.   This work, which had largely taken place in 
small groups, had continued on the basis of the subm issions tabled by both de veloped and developing 
country Members, namely submissions by Canada, the US and a group of countries including 
Argentina, Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Malaysia and Pakistan.  Copies of these submissions had been 
made available to Members at the March meeting.  Based on these submissions and to facilitate the 
discussions he had, in May, tabled under his r esponsibility, a non-paper highlighting the possible 
areas of convergence.  This non-paper, which ha d been made available in the room, identified 
elements on which there was a greater degree of convergence and those elements on which further 
work was required.  He pointed out that the elemen ts that appeared in the sections headed "possible 
areas of convergence" were not agreed and merely reflected those elements on which positions were 
converging.  While work had been continuing on the basis of his non-paper, the other submissions 
remained on the table.  He said that at the small group meeting held in the previous week, Members 
had been able to have a read through the entire non -paper and while there was still work to be done 
before agreement could be reached, some progr ess had been made.  Members had made their 
positions clear and some of the clarifications sought  had been addressed.  This had helped give him a 
better idea of the elements that were acceptab le and those where further work as required.  
3. Without going into too much detail, he went on to highlight a few points with respect to the 
different elements of the mechanis m.  With respect to the preamble , he said that positions remained 
far apart and there seemed to be conceptual di fferences on what the objectives of the Monitoring 
Mechanism should be.  Due to these differences, Members had suggested  that the best way to proceed 
was perhaps to move on and consider other elements  of the mechanism and revert to the preamble TN/CTD/M/36 
Page 2  
 
  once the other elements had fallen into place.  On the structure
 of the Mechanism, discussions had 
progressed fairly well.  There were, however, some elements which would need further clarification 
and where Members would need to further refine th e language.  In this context, he said that some 
Members had suggested alternative language which w ould be considered in future meetings.  He 
added that there had also been suggestions to move  some of the elements in the structure to other 
more relevant sections of the mechanism.  With respect to the scope  of the Mechanism, he said that 
while there was still work to be done, Members ha d been able to further clarify their proposed 
elements and there seemed to be a preference among some Members to delete  those elements that 
were not clear.  On the question of a list, Member s seemed to agree that it would not be necessarily 
helpful to have such a list as they would be free to  raise concerns with respect to any special and 
differential treatment provision.  Fi nally, with regard to the functions  of the Mechanism, here again 
Members were working on further clarifying as we ll as building on existing elements.  Since they 
related to how the mechanism would function in prac tice, there had been suggestions to ensure that 
the proposed Secretariat report which would be used  as part of the monitoring exercise, also include 
best practices.  Other elements, including altern ative language, had been proposed and would be 
considered in more detail at future meetings.  In his view, Members were on the right track.   
4. He informed Members that the Secretaria t update on the paper on "The Special and 
Differential Treatment Provisions in the WTO Agreem ents" was in the process of being finalized and 
should be ready in August 2009.  The paper would first be distributed as a JOB document to be discussed after the summer break.  Members' views c ould then be incorporated before the paper was 
distributed as an official WTO document.  
5. With respect to the Category II proposals, he  said that the Secretariat had attempted to 
identify those proposals that were being addressed either in part or in their entirety, in the ongoing 
work in the different WTO bodies including in the negotiating bodies.  The next stage was to 
consider, in collaboration with the relevant Chai rpersons, the best way to expedite progress on these 
proposals, particularly those that were not be ing addressed as part of the ongoing work.   
6. The Chairman concluded by saying that with respect to the way forward, after the summer 
break, he intended to continue concentrating on fu rther refining the elements of the Monitoring 
Mechanism on the basis of his non-paper.  This wo rk would continue in small group consultations and 
as had been the practice, he would keep the wider Membership abreast of any developments.  On the 
Agreement-specific proposals, he would consider a ttempting to close the remaining gaps on the six 
proposals, which Members had earlier been addressi ng.  However, this would largely depend on 
whether Members were willing to demonstrate th e flexibility necessary to make progress.  He 
believed that Members were not too far from c onvergence on these proposals, and once agreed, they 
could be added to the existing list of 28 proposals already agreed to in principle.  
C. 
OTHER BUSINESS  
7. No matter was raised under "Other Business". 
 
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