Indonesia Emphasises Agricultural Reform at WTO Forum
Jakarta (ANTARA) — Indonesia’s Minister of Trade Budi Santoso announced that Indonesia will discuss strengthening agricultural reform consolidation for submission to the 14th Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), scheduled for 26–29 March 2026 in Cameroon.
Santoso stated that the 14th Ministerial Conference should be leveraged as an opportunity to revive WTO agricultural negotiations, which have stalled in recent years.
“Indonesia emphasises that the 14th WTO Ministerial Conference must be utilised to revive WTO agricultural negotiations that have been stagnant in recent years. Indonesia, as G-33 coordinator, calls for WTO agricultural reform to remain development-oriented,” Santoso said in a statement in Jakarta on Tuesday.
Several aspects, including food security, smallholder farmer welfare, and the national development agenda, must form the central focus of reform direction, he added.
This G-33 ministerial meeting carries the theme “G-33 Priorities and Collective Action toward MC-14 for Advancing Inclusive WTO Agricultural Negotiation”.
One of the primary agenda items is alignment of the G-33 Joint Ministerial Statement, which will be presented at the 14th WTO Ministerial Conference, he continued.
In that joint statement, according to Santoso, G-33 ministers will reaffirm their commitment to strengthening a rules-based, fair, inclusive, and transparent multilateral trading system with the WTO as its foundation.
Indonesia will continue to pursue a firm yet constructive approach to ensure that developing nations’ interests, including Public Stockholding for Food Security Purposes (PSH) to guarantee food security, Special Safeguard Mechanism (SSM) as an instrument to address import surges, and Special and Differential Treatment (S&DT), remain part of the WTO agricultural reform agenda.
He stated that Indonesia, together with G-33 member states, will strengthen coordination to ensure developing nations’ priority issues receive continued attention in the WTO agricultural reform agenda ahead of the 14th Ministerial Conference.
“Indonesia’s active leadership in this forum reaffirms the national commitment to advocating for a more inclusive, responsive, and development-oriented multilateral trading system, particularly in supporting food security and smallholder farmer welfare,” Santoso said.