The World Trade Organization said its working group on food security is aiming for the end of November to reach consensus on a final set of recommendations for least-developed countries (LDCs) and net food-importing developing countries (NFIDCs). During the working group's Oct. 31 meeting, participating members revised a report from the group's coordinator, Norway's Kjetil Tysdal, which covers four areas: "access to international food markets, financing of food imports, agricultural and production resilience of LDCs and NFIDCs, and horizontal, cross-cutting issues," the WTO said. Tysdal said he will make further revisions in the "coming days," noting the final meeting is set for Nov. 13, when the group is expected to finalize its recommendations for the full Committee on Agriculture's approval. The committee will meet Nov. 27-29.

The World Trade Organization on Oct. 31 launched an import licensing portal to allow members to draft and submit notifications online. The platform, released during the Committee on Import Licensing Procedures' Oct. 31 meeting, will provide members an "improved database of all import licensing procedures" of WTO countries, allowing members to search by country, product and legislation. Members can assign different levels of access to national authorities to draft, edit or submit their notifications, as well as use the portal to communicate and swap draft notifications and comments with the WTO Secretariat. During the committee meeting, members also reviewed 42 notifications of import licenses, WTO said.

Indonesia launched four safeguard investigations, covering artificial filament yarn, cotton fabric, cotton yarn and woven fabrics of artificial filament yarn, the World Trade Organization announced this week. Indonesia said interested parties should reach out to the Indonesian Safeguards Committee within 15 days from an investigation's initiation.

Madagascar opened a safeguard investigation on diapers and sanitary napkins, the island-nation told the World Trade Organization's Committee on Safeguards Oct. 26. Madagascar said it is "ready to consult on the provisional safeguard measure with Members having a substantial interest as exporters of the covered products," pursuant to Article 12.4 of the Agreement on Safeguards.

World Trade Organization members' compliance rates with notification requirements for subsidies and countervailing duties remain "concerningly low," according to the chair of the WTO's Committee on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures. Compliance is crucial to the function of that committee, its chair, New Zealand's James Lester, said Oct. 27.

Trade ministers from Japan, the U.S., the EU, the U.K., France, Canada, Germany and Italy said they will work to reach an agreement on World Trade Organization reform "with the view to having a fully and well-functioning dispute settlement system accessible to all members by 2024." The binding appellate level of dispute settlement at the WTO has been defunct since late 2019, because the U.S. blocked all appointments to the appellate body.

The World Trade Organization's Committee on Safeguards discussed ways to improve the committee's functionality during an Oct. 25 meeting, the WTO said. The committee adopted a report it sent to the Council for Trade in Goods in which it "outlined the efforts made in this area and the issues on which agreement was reached," the WTO said. Negotiations will continue regarding a joint proposal from various members, and the committee agreed on an update of the format of its annual report to boost transparency, the WTO added. During the meeting, members also discussed a host of legislative notifications of members' new or amended safeguard regulations as well as specific notifications of safeguard actions.

A World Trade Organization panel will review U.S. antidumping duties on oil country tubular goods from Argentina after Argentina's request for a dispute panel was granted by the Dispute Settlement Body, the WTO announced. Argentina's request was the second in its case arguing that the duties violate WTO rules and that the U.S. illegally cumulated imports in assessing injury caused by the subject imports.

World Trade Organization members discussed a host of new proposals on agriculture topics during Oct. 19-20 agriculture negotiation meetings, including on export restrictions, domestic support, food security and food bought at minimum prices for public stocks, the WTO said.

Senior trade officials met at the World Trade Organization Oct. 23 and 24 to "take stock of progress on issues on the negotiating agenda" in the run-up to the 13th Ministerial Conference, the WTO said. On Oct. 23, WTO members adopted a decision to aid least-developed countries in graduating from LDC status and broke out into sessions on agriculture, trade and development and dispute settlement reform. The next day, breakout sessions covered trade and industrial policy and trade and environmental sustainability.