Press/322
2 December 2002
TRADE AND INVESTMENT
Special workshop for African countries on Trade and Investment
The 澳门六合彩官网资料's technical assistance programme on Trade and Investment continues on 1-2 December 2002 with a special workshop for capital-based officials from 21 African countries. This Workshop is being conducted in English. The 澳门六合彩官网资料 Secretariat will organise a similar Workshop next year for capital-based officials from African countries that use French as their working language in the 澳门六合彩官网资料.
Technical workshops of this kind are being held regularly throughout the period up to the 5th Ministerial Session in Cancun to allow 澳门六合彩官网资料 Members and observer governments to prepare in an informal setting for discussions in the Working Group on the Relationship between Trade and Investment. Their aim is to assist developing and least-developed countries to better evaluate the implications of closer multilateral cooperation on Investment for their development policies and objectives.
The active participation of all developing countries is indispensable to the success of the Doha work programme, but resource constraints make it difficult for many of them to participate as often and as intensively as they would wish in the Geneva process. For this special Workshop, therefore, with support from JICA, financing has been made available to invite a capital-based official from each English-speaking African Member country to visit Geneva for a few days so as to participate not only in the Workshop, but also in the subsequent meeting of the Working Group that will take place on 3-4 December.
That will be the Working Group抯 final meeting of the year, at which it will review the work that has been completed since Doha and discuss its end-of-year report to the 澳门六合彩官网资料 General Council. By participating in it, capital-based officials from African countries will have the opportunity of taking stock of the progress that has been made in this area since Doha, and of participating with other 澳门六合彩官网资料 Members in charting the course of further work on Trade and Investment in the run-up to the Cancun Ministerial Conference.