ENDPRESS RELEASE
PRESS/229
18 May 2001
(01-2578)
WTO SYMPOSIUM TO FOCUS ON ISSUES
CONFRONTING THE WORLD TRADING SYSTEM
The World Trade Organization will be the venue of a symposium on critical issues confronting the
world trading system on 6 and 7 July 2001. Representatives from governments, non-governmental
organizations, the media and members of the academic community are invited to participate.
"Many important issues from food safety, the environment and access to essential medicines
are currently the subject of intense public scrutiny and need to be addressed," WTO Director-GeneralMike Moore said today. "The trading system as it stands now faces countless challenges in need of
attention. It is my hope that this symposium will further discussion and thinking about how to tackle
some of these pressing issues."
Special work sessions during the two-day symposium will focus on trade in agriculture, food
safety and sanitary and phytosanitary standards, intellectual property rights (the TRIPS Agreement),
development and environment issues and trade in services (the GATS). A fifth working session will
address the relationship between the WTO and civil society.
Registration forms are available on request or can be downloaded from the WTO's website at
www.wto.org.
To facilitate discussions and preparations for the five separate working sessions, on-line
forums on the subject areas will be launched on the WTO's website in mid-June. Participants are
encouraged to familiarize themselves not only w ith the issues, but with the views and concerns of
other participants.
For more information please contact:
Bernard Kuiten - External Relations Division
bernard.kuiten@wto.org  /  tel: 00 41 22 739 56 76 or 739 52 54
Hans-Peter Werner - Informa tion & Media Relations Division
peter.werner@wto.org  /  tel: 00 41 22 739 52 86 or 739 50 07