MANAMA: Industry and Commerce Minister and National Committee of the World Trade Organisation chairman Dr Hassan Fakhro chaired the third meeting of the committee which discussed the outcome of the ninth WTO ministerial conference held in Bali, Indonesia.

The conference discussed a number of trade agreements on trade facilitations and multilateral international trading system.

The importance of trade facilitation was confirmed, as all members of the WTO, which now includes 160 countries, supported it. Bahrain has supported trade facilitations negotiations since the sixth WTO conference in Hong Kong in 2005.

The meeting also discussed the results of a review of Bahrain’s trade policy. It approved all the reports of the government as well as WTO secretariat on the developments of the trade policy.

The meeting also reviewed the development of Bahrain trade capacity project in co-operation with United Nations Development Programme.

It also discussed activities to be held during the second half, including setting up a Bahraini committee to facilitate implementation of trade facilitation agreement and organising a conference to evaluate Bahrain’s readiness to implement the agreement.