Former WTO director-general Pascal Lamy to speak at Yale

Pascal Lamy, director-general of the World Trade Organization (WTO) from 2005 to 2013, will give a talk on “World Trade and Global Governance” on Friday, Feb. 7 at 1 p.m. in Rm. 127 of the Yale Law School, 127 Wall St.

Lamy will share the podium with Jeffrey Garten of the Yale School of Management and Ernesto Zedillo of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, who is hosting the event. Garten and Zedillo will comment on Lamy’s presentation. The event is free and open to the public.

The WTO was established in 1995 and is the only global international organization dealing with the rules of trade between nations. At its heart are the WTO agreements, negotiated and signed by the bulk of the world’s trading nations and ratified in their parliaments. The goal is to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and importers conduct their business.

Lamy’s term as the head of the WTO ended just five months ago. In a December 2013 interview, Lamy said that during his eight years as its head, the WTO had done well in its core mission — keeping trade open. What has not been done, he noted, is to update the rulebook to make trade more development friendly.

Garten is the Juan Trippe Professor in the Practice of International Trade, Finance, and Business at the Yale School of Management, and was its dean from 1995 to 2005. Prior to coming to Yale, Garten was the undersecretary of commerce for international trade. Zedillo, director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization since 2002, was the president of Mexico from 1994 to 2000 and it was his responsibility to implement NAFTA in Mexico in 1994.

The Yale Center for the Study of Globalization is devoted to examining the impact of our increasingly integrated world on individuals, communities, and nations.