On the afternoon of 7 November 2013, Mr. Alejandro Jara, formerDeputy Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO), andDr. Luzius Wasescha, former Ambassador of Switzerland to the WTO,came to visit the Gubei campus of SUIBE. SUIBE President SunHaiming and Vice President Ye Xingguo met with the guests, both ofwhom have been invited to serve as council members for the JointResearch Center on International Trade Governance and China’sReform and Open-up at SUIBE, a Shanghai think tank project.President Sun thanked the two guests for their participation in thethink tank project and discussed with them avenues for futureinternational joint research. The guests expressed their wish tocontribute to the future development of Shanghai, particularly thedevelopment of the China (Shanghai) Pilot Free Trade Zone, throughtheir involvement in the think tank project. Professor Zhang Lei,chair-holder of the WTO Chairs Program (WCP) at SUIBE, dean ofSUIBE School of WTO Research and Education, and director of thethink tank project, Ms. Xu Dongfeng, director of SUIBE Office ofInternational Exchange, Professor Yu Weili, deputy dean of SUIBESchool of WTO Research and Education, and researchers in the thinktank project were present at the meeting.
Before the meeting, the two guests held a roundtable discussionwith teachers and students from SUIBE School of WTO Research andEducation, exploring the prospects of the Ninth WTO MinisterialConference to be held in Bali, Indonesia on 3-6 December 2013 andthe trends of the multilateral trading system.
The project of “Joint Research Center on Inter
national Trade Governance and China’s Reform and Open-up” at SUIBE is among the first 18 think tank projectsapproved by the Shanghai Municipal Education Commission this year.Through cooperative research between SUIBE, the Geneva-basedInternational Center for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD),and the Honolulu-headquartered East-West Center (EWC), the thinktank on international trade and economy brings together a strongteam of researchers at home and abroad to analyze critical issuesand to provide policy advice.