EU Statement at the Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC), 01 October 2026

Many thanks, DG. Thank you also to the Chairs for their comprehensive reports.

In the EU’s view, it is important to ensure that both the WTO reform work and the negotiating aspects are devoted the necessary focus, time, and resources, allowing Members to seek convergence in both areas. We see clear synergies between the two processes, and, in fact, we believe reform should help us resolve some of the blockages and revive the negotiating function.

On reform, to start with, the EU is encouraged by the level of engagement and the many papers that are feeding a truly Member-driven process. We are however starting to see the challenges emerging for the organisation of the reform work, in terms of how we can move to more concrete, topic-based discussions, which, in our view, is the priority. The Heads of Delegation meeting yesterday was useful in this regard, and we look forward to seeing how that will feed back into the further process to help us progress.

Moving to other topics, agriculture remains, in our view, central to the negotiating agenda. The last CoA Special Session meeting showed that most of the membership wants to preserve it as the main negotiating forum. The EU notes the broad support for continued engagement through thematic sessions and endorses this way forward to bring new impetus to the discussions and lay the groundwork for more productive and purposeful negotiations.

While agriculture is naturally part of the fundamentals of the WTO, we should avoid at all costs a duplication of processes. Going forward, the agricultural negotiations will have to take duly into account the pressing challenges for the agricultural sector worldwide, such as food security, climate change and sustainability.

In relation to fisheries subsidies, the EU welcomes the support shown for the negotiation of further disciplines during last week’s Fish Week. We hope that the cautious optimism mentioned by the Chair in his report can be translated into practical and constructive discussions. In those future discussions, we agree with the Chair, we do not start from scratch and should build on what already exists. It will be critical, as well, to bring on board the Members who expressed substantive concerns last week.

The EU will continue to support the Chair’s efforts to restart negotiations in earnest and to prove that the WTO can still deliver meaningful multilateral outcomes.

We also support any efforts that you, DG, and the General Council Chair can make to break the deadlock on the e-commerce moratorium. We attach great importance to reinstating this multilateral moratorium and look forward to any progress, any efforts in this regard.

Another important part, in our view, of the negotiating agenda is plurilateral agreements. An EU priority, from this perspective, remains the incorporation of the plurilateral agreements that have been concluded: their incorporation into Annex 4—IFDA and the e-commerce agreement. For us, such an incorporation is a clear necessity for the credibility of the WTO’s negotiating function.

We want to also add that, in particular, a decision on IFDA incorporation should not be made conditional on wider WTO reform issues. The existing WTO Agreement already provides for the necessary rules and procedures for incorporating plurilaterals, and that incorporation should happen. That would be a logical response to the overwhelming support that the agreement enjoys.

Thank you, Chair.