The Public Forum is the largest annual outreach event of the WTO. eBay contributed to three days of discussions on trade, innovation and the digital economy.
On 1 October, the first day of the Public Forum, Hanne Melin of eBay Inc. Public Policy Lab joined a panel to debate the future of international trade law. Melin stressed how innovation and digital services are rapidly changing world trade by lowering costs and so inviting new trade actors. An account of the discussion can be found on the Intellectual Property Watch website.
The second day of the Public Forum opened with a Plenary Session where CEO Pay Pal EMEA Rupert Keeley was joined by the Director General of CERN, the President of Embrapa and the DG of Consumers International to exchange views on innovation and international competitiveness. Keeley expressed his personal belief in technology creating economic opportunities around the world and how at Pay Pal he is a witness to innovative services enabling small businesses grow “micro multinational” operations.
The Plenary Session also discussed the consumer as a key driver of the changes happening in world trade. Mobile devices and the Internet enable consumers to make informed choices like never before and largely without geographical, cultural and linguistic barriers. The consumer as a world trader is a new topic to the WTO, but one which merits attention: a global economy needs citizens who think and act globally. We hope that the workshop we organized in the afternoon of the second day, together with Consumers International, will contribute to furthering the debate.
The third day of the Public Forum was dedicated to the upcoming WTO Bali Ministerial, including the Trade Facilitation Agreement which will hopefully be agreed upon at the Ministerial. In support of that agreement, eBay organized a workshop together with Universal Postal Union. The purpose of the workshop was to shine a light on the trade facilitation needs of small businesses when it comes to customs and delivery.
See overview of all eBay’s contributions to the 2013 Public Forum.
As a reminder, eBay contributed to the 2012 Public Forum and we followed up with the report "Making Global Trade Frictionless".