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Following the success of the first Trade and Development Symposium, launched during the Cancun Ministerial by ICTSD and El Colegio de Mexico in September 2003, ICTSD and the University of Hong Kong co-convened the Hong Kong Trade and Development Symposium (HKTDS), in collaboration with the Institute for Agricultural Trade Policy, in conjunction with the Sixth Ministerial Conference of the WTO. This event took place at the Hong Kong Exhibition Centre on 13-17 December 2005.

The HKTDS was a central part of ICTSD's strategy to empower stakeholders through facilitating the generation of innovative thinking and analysis on pressing issues in the trade and sustainable development policy domain. It brought together acclaimed academics, policy researchers, intergovernmental organisations (IGOs), nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) with expertise and knowledge in development-related issues, consumer groups, the private sector, and parliamentarians, to speak on panels to stimulate discussions.

The goal of the HKTDS was to encourage innovative thinking on issues related to trade and development to then be translated into inputs for negotiations. The specific objectives of the HKTDS were to:

• Build greater understanding of the positive and negative development-related impacts and concerns of trade policies/rules and the current agenda;
  
  
• Promote the need for 'policy coherence' for sustainable development in relation to trade negotiations;
  
  
• Provide informed and constructive recommendations on development-related policies to key actors in the Doha Round negotiations and in regional and bilateral agreements;
  
  
• Build new networks and strengthen existing ones among the trade and development communities.

The main topics for discussions were drawn from key development-related issues in the trade policy and trade rules arena. Particular attention was paid to how trade policies can help meet the needs of sustainable human development, the Millennium Development Goals and Targets, and other public policy objectives and needs such as poverty eradication, equity, education, health and nutrition. Specific themes addressed at the HKTDS included:

Over forty organizations, covering the full spectrum of intergovernmental organizations, academic institutions, NGOs and consumer groups, organized specific panels at the HKTDS.

The HKTDS was organized in close coordination with the Hong Kong Fair Trade Fair (HKFTF) Steering Committee who hosted the HK Fair Trade Fair in the same venue. The symposium's Fair Trade sessions were organized by the HKFTF Steering Committee while the sessions that concern the Legal Dimensions of the Doha Round were organized by the Faculty of Law of the University of Hong Kong.

This symposium was open to all who wish to participate.

For further information on the HKTDS, please contact Patrick Lunt.