The Ministry of Industry, Commerce & Tourism organized national workshop on “Implementing the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement” in cooperation with the World Trade Organization during the period from 15 to 17 October 2017 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel.

During the opening ceremony, undersecretary of Commerce Affairs Mr. Nader Al Moayyed delivered a speech pointing out that the World Trade Organization has succeeded in strengthening the multilateral trading system by entering into the trade facilitation agreement on February 22, 2017, as it considered the first multilateral agreement after about 21 years ago since the establishment of the World Trade Organization in 1995, this agreement aims at accelerating trade movement, freeing goods across borders, reducing physical and temporal burdens and creating a great push for trade and development.

The workshop comes after Bahrain ratified the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement in September 2016 by Law No. (17) of 2016 by ratifying the amended Protocol of Marrakesh Agreement to establish the World Trade Organization by adding the Trade Facilitation Agreement to (A), the agreement entered into force on February 22, 2017, after the ratification of two thirds of the Members of the Organization.

The Kingdom of Bahrain has provided notification to implement procedures under category (A) of the agreement on 24 November 2015. The current phase after the entry of the Trade Facilitation Agreement into force requires notification of actions under lists B and C of the agreement. The list procedures (B) should be notified including possible dates for the Kingdom of Bahrain to apply those procedures. List procedures (C), including technical assistance requirements, and the development of capacities for the implementation of these procedures, are also identified. List procedures (C), including technical assistance requirements, and the development of capacities for implementation these procedures, are also identified.