The UK Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) produced a White Paper on Trade and Investment in mid-2004, which aimed to address, among other issues, how the multilateral trading system could be adapted to make it more flexible and of benefit to all its members, especially the poorest.
As part of the consultation process for the White Paper, the DTI UK initiated a programme of seminars on the key themes during March 2004, which included a round table on trade and development in South Africa, with the overarching theme of how the economic gains from increased trade could be spread throughout the supply chain so that all benefit from greater globalisation.
One particular aim of the South African round table was to give stakeholders in the region an opportunity to feed into UK policy on trade and provide the DTI UK with a clear African perspective on the UK's current trade policy and the issues and concerns around such policy.
The Department for International Development (DFID) facilitated and TIPS co-ordinated the South Africa round table discussion.