12-15 June 2022 Geneva, Geneve, Switzerland
Twelfth WTO Ministerial Conference

The twelfth Ministerial Conference (MC12) will meet the week of 13 June 2022, based on a decision announced on 23 February 2022.  

The World Trade Organization (WTO) Ministerial Conference, which is attended by trade ministers and other senior officials from the organization’s 164 members, is the highest decision-making body of the WTO. Under the Marrakesh Agreement establishing the WTO, the Ministerial Conference is to meet at least once every two years. The eleventh Ministerial Conference took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in December 2017.

WTO members originally agreed that MC12 would take place in June 2020 in Kazakhstan, which joined the WTO in 2015. The event was set to take place from 8-11 June in Nur-Sultan. However, on 12 March 2020, the Government of Kazakhstan announced that it would no longer host this meeting due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the WTO announced that consultations would be held to decide how to proceed with provisions for MC12. 

On 1 March 2021, the WTO announced that WTO members agreed to convene MC12 during the week of 29 November 2021 in Geneva, Switzerland. The dates were subsequently set for 30 November-3 December 2021. However, due to travel restrictions put in place following the identification of a new variant of the COVID-19 virus, the WTO announced on 26 November 2021 that MC12 would be indefinitely postponed.  

MC12 is expected to be chaired by Kazakhstan’s Timur Suleimenov.

Read about IISD’s Trade and Sustainability Hub, which will take place alongside MC12, here.

dates: 12-15 June 2022
location: Geneva, Geneve, Switzerland
www: https://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/minist_e/mc12_e/mc12_e.htm

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