ITC Attendance Report: World Trade Symposium in London
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PRESS RELEASE
Date: 16th
June 2017
Title: ITC Attendance Report: World Trade Symposium in London
Nikole Read (ITC Chairperson for Canada) together with Lord John Taylor, Baron of Warwick (member of
the House of Lords in the Parliament of the United Kingdom and ITC Representative to the World Trade
Symposium)
Report by Nikole Read, ITC Chairperson for Canada
I was delighted to take a part in the World Trade Symposium in London accompanied
by my colleague Lord John Taylor of Warwick . The World Trade Symposium held in in
London on 6-7 June 2017 fulfilled its purpose for a highly interactive, action-oriented C-
Level dialogue on the major themes that will shape the future direction of international
trade. From 28 speakers to interactive table discussions, this event was filled with
experts, industry leaders and trade organizations that all came together to discuss
direction of international trade. This event brought discussions on how trade can be
transformed to drive financial inclusion through globalization and digitization. Over the
two days we have seen the guest speakers discussing topics on One Belt, One Road
2. Road Initiative (BRI), block-chain technologies, supply chain and SME finance. This
highly interactive symposium was further enhanced by working groups to investigate
the issues and opportunities for global trade and explore the potential to transform
trade with digital at its core – with a vision of “improving people’s” lives. The four
initiatives included:
Supporting the development of sustainable trade –The group explored the
potential to apply similar technology to monitor the ethical provenance of goods in
support of sustainable trade within a circular economy.
Widening inclusion in global trade for small and medium sized enterprises
(SMEs) – To open up an access to trade finance for SMEs, helping to close today’s
$1.6 trillion global trade finance funding gap.
Driving global adoption of Legal Entity Identifiers (LEIs) –The objective was to
improve transparency, support trade finance digitalisation and streamline onboarding
and risk management along global financial supply chains in order to underpin more
inclusive trade and SME finance.
Increasing the level of digitisation of trade through education and
encouraging adoption – To enhance awareness of the potential of new technologies
such as block-chain and distributed ledger across the different parts of the trade
ecosystem, from producers to collateral managers to shipping firms, as well as banks,
governments and non-governmental organizations.
This press release was distributed by the International Trade Council.
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