. /.  WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  WT/MIN(05)/ST/166 
17 December 2005 
 (05-6181) 
MINISTERIAL CONFERENCE 
Sixth Session Hong Kong, 13 - 18 December 2005 Original:   English 
 
  
VANUATU 
 
Statement by the Honourable James Bule
 
Minister of Trade, Tourism and Commerce  
 
(Speaking as an Observer) 
 
  Firstly I would like to join other speakers in registering my thanks and appreciation to the 
Government and people of Hong Kong in organizing this important Ministerial Conference.  
Hong Kong has given my delegation a first-class we lcome.  We also thank the WTO Secretariat and 
AITIC, and look forward to their continued support fo r the participation of least developed countries 
in these important WTO discussions.  
 I would like to reaffirm Vanuatu's position that it is committed to becoming a Member of the 
WTO.  Our accession is almost as old as the WTO it self, but since we started on the road towards 
membership over ten years ago, Vanuatu has become  an increasingly open economy.  This has been 
seen both in the foreign investment regime and in  trade in goods, including commodity exports.  
These reforms have created jobs, increased living standards and made Vanuatu a stronger economy 
than before.  Yet, it is also fair to say that stab ility and certainty for Vanuatu 's investors and exporters 
remain something of a rare commodity, and being pa rt of the rules-based multilateral trading system 
would be a strong signal about our commitment to engaging with the rest of the world.   Despite this commitment, Vanuatu must also be recognized as an LDC, which is made up of 
not one but more than eighty islands, each of them  small and vulnerable.  Many of these islands 
remain poorly connected with urban centres, let alone major export markets, and receive limited 
government services.  As in other Pacific islands, natural disasters are a fact of life in Vanuatu – last week my own home island of Ambae was threatened  with a major volcanic eruption, putting the lives 
and livelihoods of more than 10,000 people in danger.  It is in this context that I urge Members to 
understand why special measures are needed to s upport the integration of  small and vulnerable 
economies into the world economy, as outlined in  the Doha Mandate.  To deny the special 
circumstances of small and vulnerabl e economies like those in the Paci fic, with limited export bases 
and fragile existences, is to restrict their opportunity  to use trade as a tool for economic development. 
  Many have said that the Doha Round offe rs developing countries an escape route from 
poverty.  We welcome progress this week toward s duty-free and quota-free market access for LDCs.  
But along with other LDCs we share the concern that we will only benefit if th is is implemented in a 
timely fashion and if it actually opens up trade in s ectors where they have an export interest.  Even 
with market access, it is still difficult to export to many major markets, because of their restrictive 
rules of origin and SPS requirements.  
 "Aid for Trade" is also vitally important for the Pacific region, which is rich in resources but 
lacks the capacity to exploit them.  Two initiativ es starting soon in Vanuatu are a programme of 
infrastructure investments sponsored by the Mille nnium Challenge Account, and support under the WT/MIN(05)/ST/166 
Page 2  
 
 Integrated Framework.  On the latter we wish to thank the IF Steering Committee for agreeing to 
Vanuatu's request to become the first country in th e Pacific to receive IF funding.  We see it as a key 
building block to develop our future trade with the rest of the world.   Finally, on our own accession, I am pleased to confirm to the Ministerial Conference that my 
government is giving serious consideration to restar ting accession talks in the near future.  Four years 
ago, Vanuatu decided to suspend its accession process, because we believed that some of the demands being asked from us were greater than we could commit to, particularly in the area of services.   Since then we feel that much has changed, and we were happy to see members of the General 
Council agreeing with us in their 10 December  2002 Guidelines on LDC accessions.  These, for the 
first time, stated explicitly that acceding LDCs should not be subjected to onerous demands from 
existing members.  We look to good faith from the se members to make sure  that the guidelines are 
respected when talks begin agai n, with a resulting change in the demands being placed on us 
compared to the years before this statement.  We  believe that Vanuatu's accession will be the best 
"test case" of whether these guidelines are being implemented or not. 
  Vanuatu wants to be a Member of the WTO and enjoy the same privileges and certainty as 
other Members.  There are many doubters back home in Vanuatu who believe that we should not play 
our part in the multilateral trading system or the global economy.  While therefore we believe with 
others that there remain only a few issues to reso lve in our accession, we attach equal importance to 
building domestic ownership of the process, and we do not have a par ticular timeframe for joining.  
First and foremost we wish to achieve an acc ession package which meets all the development 
requirements of Vanuatu.   In concluding, I am able to look forward to the successful conclusion of two rounds of 
negotiations.  The first is the Doha Development Round, to give meaningful results to the small 
islands of the Pacific and developing countri es elsewhere.  The second is our own accession to the 
WTO, on terms which meet our development needs, so  that Vanuatu can also start to see and reap 
equally the benefits of the global economy, as predicted by the Doha Development Agenda. 
 
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