On 16 March 2026, Ministers and representatives from 10 members of the Future of Investment and Trade (“FIT“) Partnership – Costa Rica, Iceland, Liechtenstein, New Zealand, Norway, Paraguay, Rwanda, Singapore, Switzerland and Uruguay – convened virtually and endorsed a Ministerial Declaration on Strengthening the Rules-Based Trading System (“Declaration”). Chile and Malaysia endorsed the Declaration on 20 March 2026, followed by Brunei on 1 April 2026, bringing the total number of endorsing members to 13. The Declaration was issued ahead of the 14th World Trade Organisation (“WTO“) Ministerial Conference (MC14) held on 26-29 March 2026. The Ministry of Trade and Industry (“MTI“) announced this via press release dated 16 March 2026, updated on 1 April 2026.
The Declaration was developed under the FIT Partnership’s “Strengthening the Rules-Based Trading System” workstream, co-led by Costa Rica, Norway and Singapore.
In the Declaration, Ministers highlighted priority areas where FIT Partnership members will work together, as well as with other WTO members, to support progress at the WTO, including:
- strengthening the multilateral trading system, with the WTO at its core, to ensure it remains credible, effective and able to respond to current trade challenges;
- incorporating the WTO Investment Facilitation for Development Agreement (“IFDA“) and the WTO E-Commerce Agreement (“E-Commerce Agreement“) into the WTO legal architecture, while promoting IFDA- and E-Commerce Agreement-consistent provisions with other bilateral, regional and plurilateral agreements, where appropriate (please see our related Update on “Sixty-six WTO Members Adopt WTO E-Commerce Agreement with Interim Arrangements” for more information);
- supporting a permanent moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions;
- preserving the effectiveness and credibility of the WTO dispute settlement system, including through a shared commitment not to appeal into the void, and use the Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (“MPIA“) in future and current WTO disputes as an interim appeal mechanism pending the completion of dispute settlement reform;
- supporting outreach by FIT Partnership members to other WTO members to encourage participation in and use of the MPIA; and
- furthering agriculture reform at the WTO in line with Article 20 of the Agreement on Agriculture.
The FIT Partnership is a platform for like-minded small, medium and trade-dependent countries to incubate and pilot innovative solutions to facilitate trade and investment, reinforce the rules-based trading system, and contribute to a predictable, transparent, non-discriminatory, open and fair global trading environment.
Click on the following link for more information:
- Joint Press Release – FIT Partnership Ministers issue Declaration on Strengthening the Rules-Based Trading System (available on the MTI website at mti.gov.sg)
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