U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai officially signed the instrument of acceptance of the World Trade Organization fisheries subsidies deal struck at the 12th Ministerial Conference. With the signing, the U.S. became the fourth WTO member, and first large fishing nation, to formally accept the deal. Two-thirds of WTO members must accept the deal for it to take effect.

Australia will pause its World Trade Organization case against China on barley for three months while Beijing reviews its restrictions, Australia announced this week. China placed 80.5% duties on Australian barley in 2020. The parties recently carried out "constructive dialogue at all levels," leading to a three- to four-month reprieve in the WTO case, Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong said April 11.

World Trade Organization members agreed to measures to increase the Council for Trade in Goods' transparency and efficiency and improve its functionality, the WTO said. Agreeing to the reform actions during the April 3-4 meeting of the council, the member nations agreed to include the integration of the council's data into the Trade Concerns Database and introduce the eAgenda into the council work, starting at its next meeting in July. The eAgenda lets members electronically add agenda items, raise specific concerns and upload statements before meetings. The council also elected a new chair, elevating Nigeria's Adamu Mohammed Abdulhamid to the role for the next year. The next council meeting is set for July 6-7.

World Trade Organization members agreed to scrap the Annex to the Draft Agreement on investment facilitation for development during a two-day negotiating round leading up to the April 5 plenary meeting, the WTO said. The Annex included three pending issues -- movement of businesspersons, definition of the term "enterprise," and a proposal to exclude "non-discriminatory measures of general application in the pursuit of monetary and related credit policies or exchange rate policies."

The Philippines notified the World Trade Organization on April 4 that it began a preliminary safeguard investigation on liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) cylinders. The investigation was initiated after a request by the country’s LPG steel cylinder industry, which said increased imports of the cylinders “cause serious injury to the domestic industry,” including “declining market share, production, sales, capacity utilization, employment profitability, incurred losses, and existence of price depression and price undercutting.” Interested parties can comment on the investigation by making submissions to the Bureau of Import Services via bis_irmd@dti.gov.ph within five days of April 4.

Trade ministers from the U.S., Japan, the EU, Canada, the U.K., France, Germany and Italy said they will work for "necessary reform" at the World Trade Organization, including trying to reach an agreement to restore "a fully and well-functioning dispute settlement system accessible to all Members by 2024."

World Trade Organization members were updated on dispute settlement system reform informal talks during the March 31 meeting of the Dispute Settlement Body, the WTO said. Guatemala's Deputy Permanent Representative to the WTO, Marco Molina he held over 40 bilateral meetings with delegates and regional coordinators representing over 130 WTO nations in February. "An online template was created" so that countries could submit proposals, and 70 have been received to date, the WTO said. Molina said a calendar of meetings up to the first week of July was created, and that members expect to include agreed-to solutions in a "green" table before the summer break, laying a foundation for drafting reform points once members return from the break and concluding at the end of the year.

World Trade Organization members elected New Zealand's Clare Kelly to serve as the new head of the Committee on Regional Trade Agreements. Members at the March 27 meeting also reviewed five existing trade agreements, looking at the EU-U.K. RTA on goods and services, the economic partnership agreement between Eastern and Southern Africa states and the U.K., and the U.K.-Japan comprehensive economic cooperation and partnership agreement; the India-Mauritius CEPA; and the Turkey-Serbia free trade deal, WTO said. The next meeting is set for July 3-4.

U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai said her team is on "phase three" of its reform talks at the World Trade Organization, saying that phase brings in all WTO members. Tai, speaking during a March 24 House Ways and Means Committee hearing, said her team in Geneva is "bringing written proposals every meeting" with the goal of making "a more functional negotiating forum." The aim is to move WTO dispute settlement away from litigation and toward negotiation, Tai said. She also decried the WTO's recent rulings against the Section 232 national security tariff action, saying they "are deeply concerning to us and to our national security sovereignty."

World Trade Organization members recently adopted “a range of tools and recommendations” that the body said will improve implementation of the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Measures. Those recommendations were outlined in two documents adopted by the SPS Committee, including one, G/SPS/67, that lists “existing tools and resources to enhance the implementation” of the SPS agreement for SPS approval procedures for food, animal and plant products, and another, G/SPS/68, that provides recommendations on SPS approval procedures.