WTO headquarters in Geneva. (Keystone/Salvatore Di Nolfi)

🌎Opinion: Why efforts to reform the WTO need to move out of Geneva. Ministers back in their capitals need to rally support for the global trade system and encourage its use. Leaving it to Geneva delegates won’t work, write trade experts Peter Ungphakorn and Robert Wolfe.

⏰New body adopts intense timetable for final pandemic agreement talks. The Intergovernmental Working Group met for the first time last week, and chose Brazil’s ambassador Tovar da Silva Nunes and the UK official, Mathew Harpur, as co-chairs. The next round of talks is slated for mid-September.

🛑ICYMI: Controversial WHO regional director placed on leave. Saima Wazed, the World Health Organization’s regional director for South East Asia and daughter of Bangladesh’s toppled leader Sheikh Hasina, was placed on leave on Friday, following accusations of corruption.

⚓BCG earned more than $1m for Gaza aid barge project. The management consulting group helped the Geneva-based Maritime Humanitarian Aid Foundation and Fogbow design a maritime corridor between Gaza and Cyprus, ultimately overtaken by a US military pier.

🛕Sand and dust storms intensify global health and economic crises. The World Meteorological Organization revealed that these airborne hazards now affect an estimated 330 million people in over 150 countries, imposing an increasing health and economic burden.