WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION   
WT/GC/W/643 
28 October 2011 
 (11-5474) 
General Council Original:   English 
  
 
IMPROVING THE GUIDELINES FOR GRANTING OBSERVER STATUS  
TO INTERGOVERNMENTAL OR GANIZATIONS IN THE WTO 
 
Communication from the Arab Group 
  
The following communication, dated 27 October 2011, is being circulated at the request of 
the Delegation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, on behalf of the Arab Group.  
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1. Introduction 
International Intergovernmental Organizations (IGOs) have increasingly been involved in the 
structuring of the world trading system, but too few are invited to take part in the activities of the WTO. A significant number of requests by IGOs for observer status with General Council and 
subsidiary WTO bodies remain outstanding. To this e nd, it is important for the WTO to reflect on its 
cooperation with IGOs and on the conditions that they must be associated to the WTO. These 
conditions must be clear and objective and the observer granting process should be neutral and 
transparent.   2. Observer Status for International Intergovernmental Organizations 
Ministers sought through the Marrakesh Agreemen t (Article V:1) to authorize the General 
Council to establish appropriate arrangements to ensure the eff ective cooperation and consultation 
between the WTO and other Intergovernmental Or ganizations (IGOs) that have responsibilities 
related to and/or are concerned with matters re lated to the WTO. Ministers also emphasized, in 
pursuance of the WTO’s Trade and Development pr inciples and objectives, the need to establish 
appropriate collaboration arrangements with other IG Os whose activities relate to trade and economic 
development.  
Accordingly, the General Council adopted the gui delines for granting observer status in July 
1996 as set forth in Annex III of the rules of proce dure of the Ministerial Conference and the General 
Council (WT/L/161), with the purpose of facilitating th e representation and participation of IGOs in 
the activities of WTO. These guidelines provide that the purpose of granting IGOs observer status is 
to enable them to follow discussions on matters of dir ect interest to them within the WTO. In a trading 
environment that is both more integrated and mo re complex, it is important for specialized and 
regional IGOs to be fully aware of the work of the WTO in order to maintain coherence in with 
respect to developing strategies.  
 
Despite the aforementioned, for more than a decade now, it seems that these guidelines were, 
in themselves, insufficient to warrant IGOs' pa rticipation as permanent observers in the WTO. 
Divergences over the application of these guidelines have dominated Members’ discussions since 1999. In the meantime, the list of IGOs requesting pe rmanent observer status continues to grow with WT/GC/W/643 
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  no clear indication as to how some have been grante d permanent observer status while others, with a 
clear development mandate, have been barred from r eceiving the same status within the various WTO 
bodies. Moreover, no new IGOs have been granted obser ver status. It therefore appears that there are 
no generally applicable, precise, objective and transp arent criteria that govern the process of granting 
observer status to IGOs.  
 
Requests for observer status have, for the past ten years, been arbitrary, where the opposition 
of one or a limited number of Members have blocked the prospect s for collaboration with IGOs as 
permanent observers in the WTO. In this it is wo rth recalling that, the League of Arab States (LAS) 
submitted numerous requests to become a permanen t observer to several bodies of the World Trade 
Organization (WTO). Regrettably however, all the aforementioned efforts came to no avail due to 
positions maintained by two Members. This proved  to be a disquieting precedents in the WTO, 
whereby the consideration of requests for permanent observer status became, for the first time, a non 
procedural matter, but rather a politicized issue that is in direct contravention with the principles of 
the WTO and the guidelines established under Annex III of the rules of procedures of the Ministerial 
Conference and General Council. 
 
Moreover, it is important to recall that the LA S had in fact maintained permanent observer 
status under GATT 1947. Nevertheless, the LAS con tinues to be barred from being granted similar 
status in the WTO. Evidently, this situation is inconsistent with the established procedures, wherein 
favourable consideration s hould have been given to the requests s ubmitted by IGOs that have been in 
the past associated with the work of the Contracting Parties to GATT 1947.  
 
The LAS plays a mandatory role in coordina ting Arab positions on trade and trade related 
matters and assumes an important role in ha rmonizing both economic and trade policy amongst its 
Members. The LAS would therefore satisfy the c ondition that it has the competence and oversight 
over trade policy formulation as prescribed by the WT O’s relevant rules and guidelines. The LAS also 
administers the implementation of Arab regional economic and trade integration initiatives as well as 
oversees the implementation of the Greater Arab Free Trade Area (GAFTA). It is interesting to note that despite the fact that this  Regional Trade Arrangement (RTA) had been notified to the WTO 
according to prescribed transparency procedures ye t the LAS has remained outside the boundaries of 
the WTO.  
 
Considering the difficulties that some IGOs have  faced in having their requests for observer 
status properly considered by the WTO, it would be  useful for Members to evaluate and revise the 
rules governing the process of granting IGOs observer status in the WTO. Ther e is a need to ensure 
that any request by an IGO to gain permanent ob server status in the WTO should only be gauged on 
the basis of the technical merits of such requests. Objective and technical criteria need to be in place 
to ensure the proper application of the existi ng guidelines applicable to IGO participation and 
representation in the WTO. Falling short of attaini ng this requirement further risk jeopardizing the 
credibility of the WTO as a rules based multilateral trading system.  
 
3. Proposed Ministerial language 
Ministers,  
Cognisant of the importance of enhancing the participation of Intergovernmental 
Organizations, that have responsibiliti es related to those undertaken by the WTO, Ministers note that a 
significant number of requests for observer status in the General Council and subsidiary bodies remain 
outstanding,   WT/GC/W/643 
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  Ministers reaffirm the need to establish appropr iate arrangements for the effective cooperation 
and participation of IGOs in the WTO; and direct th e General Council to review and elaborate, by (an 
agreed date before the next session of the Ministerial Conference), the necessary technical criteria that 
should allow for a transparent, uniform, objective consideration and examination of all IGO requests 
for permanent observer status to the WTO. 
 
 
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