The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) are organizing the eighteenth session of the SPECA Working Group on Trade on 20 November 2023, back-to-back with the annual SPECA events in Baku. The Working Group supports cross-border and regional cooperation for the implementation of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda in Central Asia (notably SDG targets 17.10 and 17.11) to advance green and sustainable trade. The session will focus on the deliverables of the SPECA Working Group on Trade:

1. collaboration among SPECA participating States in the WTO process,
2. progress in the implementation of the SPECA Trade Facilitation Strategy and related roadmap,
3. progress in the implementation of the Principles for Sustainable Trade in the subregion,
4. studies and recommendations on regulatory and procedural non-tariff barriers to trade, and
5. digitalization of data and document exchange in multimodal transport and trade using UN standards.

The event will review national and regional plans and strategies of the SPECA countries for sustainable trade facilitation and development. It will strengthen cooperation among trade diplomats of the SPECA countries. Participants in the session and SPECA participating States are requested to contribute their good practices and identify priority actions on which the SPECA Working Group on Trade could work in the coming 2-3 years.

Target audience: trade policymakers from the SPECA countries.

H.E. Mr. Nuriddinzoda, Deputy Minister of Economic Development and Trade of Tajikistan and Chairperson of the SPECA Working Group on Trade, will moderate the eighteenth session of the SPECA Working Group on Trade. Its overall objectives are to foster exchange of experiences and mutual assistance among the SPECA countries, achieve the trade-related SDGs, review the implementation of the regional trade facilitation strategy, principles of sustainable trade, standards for digitalization of multimodal data and document exchange, elimination of non-tariff barriers to trade and encourage the development of a regional private sector network in support of these objectives.