The Eighth Global Review of Aid for Trade will take place from July 27 to 29 both in-person as well as virtually at WTO headquarters  in Geneva, Switzerland with the theme of “Empowering Connected, Sustainable Trade”.

The review will bring to the fore areas where developing and least-developed countries (LDCs) need support to overcome supply-side constraints limiting their participation in international trade. The event will be opened by Director-General Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.

Aid for Trade helps developing countries — LDCs in particular — to boost their trading capacities.  The Global Review helps galvanize support to address supply-side and trade-related infrastructure obstacles so that developing countries can derive maximum benefit from international trade.

The Review will feature the launch of a joint publication by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the WTO entitled “Aid for Trade at a Glance 2022: Empowered Connected, Sustainable Trade”.

It will delve into the responses to the self-assessment questionnaires that donors (bilateral and multilateral agencies), regional economic communities/transport corridors, South-South partners and developing and LDCs submitted over the last few months as part of the monitoring and evaluation exercise.

Under consideration in the exercise were the following:

•    Aid for Trade priorities and how these have changed since the last monitoring exercise
•    Policies for sustainable development
•    Policies for women's economic empowerment.

This exercise also focused on understanding the opportunities that green growth and digital connectivity offer to meet multiple targets in the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda while promoting economic and export diversification. – TradeArabia News Service