"I am honoured to have been asked to undertake this new assignment for ICC. I look forward to my work with others on the Commission to help create more jobs and more economic growth by lowering the remaining barriers to international trade and investment worldwide."

Mr Bacchus was the only North American of the Appellate Body during his eight years and two terms of service to the WTO. He has a comprehensive knowledge of the global trade rules in the WTO treaty, which are over 30,000 pages. He has also written and contributed to the clarification of these rules in WTO dispute settlements, which amount to more than 50,000 pages.

Mr Bacchus is one of two chairs of Greenberg Traurig’s Global Practice Group. He is a former member of the Congress of the United States (1991-1995), who represented the 15th Congressional District of Florida as a member of the United States House of Representatives. He is also a former Special Assistant to the United States Trade Representative in the Executive Office of the President.

Mr Bacchus was the only member of the Appellate Body who served on the tribunal during all 60 appeals in the first eight years of the new international trade institution, which is the global successor to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade – the GATT. The international trade disputes he judged involved billions of dollars in annual trade relating to goods, services and intellectual property. Cases included apples and bananas, automobiles and airplanes, semiconductors and supercomputers, agriculture, textiles, clothing, chemicals, pharmaceuticals and steel.

He became known for his work on trade and The American Lawyer said: "James Bacchus, as much as anyone, can lay claim to being the John Marshall of the World Trade Organization."

While in Congress, Mr Bacchus led bipartisan efforts to advance international trade issues. He was a supporter of presidential "fast-track" negotiating authority on trade issues, a leading supporter of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), a vocal advocate of extending most-favoured-nation treatment for China, a champion of the Caribbean Basin Initiative, and one of the six original co-sponsors of implementing legislation for the Uruguay Round trade agreements that established the WTO.

He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Bretton Woods Committee, and the Evian Group. He has served on the Executive Council of the American Society of International Law.

Mr Bacchus authored the book Trade and Freedom, published in London in 2004. He writes and speaks frequently on international issues in publications and on platforms worldwide.

For more information on the work of this commission please visit the ICC Commission on Trade and Investment Policy.