On 10 November 2011, President Sun Haiming met with the WTO DeputyDirector-General Mrs. Valentine Sendanyoye Rugwabiza who came toShanghai for the 11th World Free Zone Convention. President Sunwarmly welcomed Mrs. Sendanyoye Rugwabiza’s visit. He said thatsince our university was selected as one of the WTO ChairsProgramme institutes, we had put a large amount of human resources,materials and financial support into the Programme. A new WTOLiterature Center has been established. We have held severalinternational seminars covering the topics of “anti tradeprotectionism”, “technology rise and intellectual property rights”and “global governance in the 21st century”. Each year, SIFTenrolls dozens of post-graduate students whose research interestsfocus on the WTO related topics. We have consecutively held foursessions of “National Summer School for the WTO- OrientedPostgraduates” under the Shanghai Postgraduates’ EducationInnovation Program and the WTO Chairs Programme. Over 200 traineesfrom universities, institutes and enterprises have joined theSummer School. President Sun wishes to further our cooperation withthe WTO Secretariat in the fields of WTO database construction, WTOresearch methodology and policy analysis, decision-making supportto Chinese governmental bodies, personnel development for theconstruction of Shanghai as an international trade center, WTOTrade Policy Review translation and trainings to neighboringcountries.
Mrs. Valentine Sendanyoye Rugwabiza currently occupies the post ofDeputy Director-General of the World Trade Organization. In thisrole, which she took up in October 2005, Mrs. SendanyoyeRugwabiza's responsibility covers development issues and policiesgenerally; trade policy review; trade facilitation, and trainingand technical cooperation. She is also responsible for the WTOChairs Programme. During the meeting, Mrs. Sendanyoye Rugwabizasaid that the WCP held by SIFT was not only significant to theWTO-related knowledge dissemination in China, but also formedimplications to other WTO members. She would like to facilitate thecooperation between relative WTO departments with SIFT, furthercooperative researches on key areas of database construction,summer school, other regional training program and WTO literaturetranslation, and keep on exploring more possibilities ofcooperation in a wider landscape.
After the meeting, the Deputy Director-General visited the WTOLiterature Center located in our library and made an initialdiscussion on the cooperation of documentation.
Mrs. Xu Dongfeng, Director of the International Exchange Office,Prof. Zhang Lei, Dean of the School of WTO Research and Education,Mrs. Yu Weili, Deputy Dean of the School of WTO Research andEducation and Mrs. Wang Qun, Deputy Dean of Libraries also attendedthe meeting.