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As Bangladesh is increasingly facing anti-dumping measures on its imports by India, the issue should be taken to the World Trade Organisation (WTO) for settlement, a Canadian trade expert suggested in Dhaka yesterday. "But before going to WTO there should be diplomatic negotiations first," Dennis Browne, director emeritus, Centre for Trade Policy and Law, Carleton University, Canada, told a discussion of The Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD). He said Bangladesh should resort to dispute settlement unit of the global trade body to solve the problem as the country is denied trade benefits. "The least developed countries shy away from WTO dispute resolution due to the time-consuming process, high cost and complex procedures," said Browne, keynote speaker at the dialogue on 'Dispute Settlement in the WTO: How Friendly Is It for the LDCs?' The CPD, an independent think-tank, organised the dialogue in collaboration with the Centre for Trade Policy and Law, Canada at CIRDAP auditorium. "So far, a total of 280 disputes have been brought to WTO but no LDC is involved with these," the Canadian expert told the discussion citing reluctance of poor countries to go to the WTO for trade dispute settlement. Stressing the need for poor countries' capacity building efforts on both negotiations and dispute settlement, he said dispute settlement procedures should be more LDC-friendly and have provision of compensation for damages. Addressing the dialogue, Commerce Minister Amir Khosru Mahmud Chowdhury said the WTO dispute settlement panel should have representation from LDCs while dealing with any dispute involving poor countries.

"As the legal battle is time-consuming and expensive, there should be monetary compensation for the winning party," he said. The negotiations to settle a dispute could be arranged in the LDCs concerned to save cost, he said. He proposed setting up a global trust for financing capacity building programmes in the LDCs for taking part in dispute settlement process, which is complex in nature. CPD Executive Director Dr Debapriya Bhattacharya who chaired the dialogue said WTO should simplify the procedures of dispute settlement to resolve disputes in the shortest possible time. About the enforcement of WTO rulings, former commerce secretary Syed Alamgir Farruk Chowdhury said even if a country gets a ruling in its favour, it cannot help the country as implementation is so hard. "If EU struggles to implement WTO ruling against US, how an LDC like Bangladesh implement ruling against a developed country," he said. Former Ambassador MM Rezaul Karim said many countries do not prefer to go to the WTO dispute settlement body in fear that bilateral relations with the defending country would worsen. LDCs often shy away from taking recourse to WTO dispute settlement in fear of retaliation by rich countries, he added. GM Kader, a member of the parliament, said mighty countries do not comply with WTO rulings on trade disputes hurting the poor countries' interest. Ghulam Murtoza, general manager of Bangladesh Bank, said WTO should play proper role in facing trade crisis emanating from epidemic like bird flu and mad cow.