World Trade Organization Negotiations Research Articles

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THE TASKS OF WTO : DEVELOPMENT AND CHALLENGES As of today the rules developed within the World Trade Organisation (WTO) are no longer limited to market access, undistorted competition and coordination of domestic trade policies. More and more WTO law affects the internal politics of members in a wide array of areas formerly typically considered as purely of domestic relevance. This leads to a new challenge for the WTO : It must take into account non-economic values (such as environmental protection, social issues or fair competition) without allowing them to unduly reduce the important achievements in the traditional areas of GATT and WTO negotiations of the last almost sixty years. This essay looks at the traditional functions or activities of the WTO as an organisation : negotiations, dispute settlement and outreach. With regard to the traditional model of GATT/WTO negotiations (negotiating rounds, consensus) it is argued that this model does not longer suffice in view of the new issues and the complexity of the social problems touched upon. This should, among other things, also lead to the creation of a judicial committee which could finally tackle systemic issues in a more coherent way than this has been possible so far. The dispute settlement of the WTO is one of the areas most discussed in the years after the coming into effect of the Marrakesh Agreement. Here issues like the (partial) professionalisation of the dispute settlement panels and their secretariat, a strengthening of the legal service within the WTO towards the establishment of a true WTO legal adviser, interim measures and monetary sanctions could improve the current system and help to overcome some of the current criticism. Also in this area a legal committee and possibly an advisory body with representatives from academia could be very helpful. With regard to outreach it is recommended that the WTO works more through regional offices, like other international institutions. Local presence and a better understanding of local problems would increase the credibility of the organisation and its acceptance by constituencies worldwide. This could also be achieved by creating a net of partner universities and academic institutions involved in teaching and research regarding world trade.

Framework Agreement on Comprehensive Economic Co‑operation between India and ASEAN: First Step Towards Economic Integration

I. Introduction Regional co-operation agreements in the past were regarded as precursors to inward-oriented economic blocs and, therefore, stumbling blocks to multilateral trade. However, they are now considered as complementing and having a positive affect on global trade liberalization (if they are consistent with WTO provisions) and are becoming the order of the day all over the world. Declining market access in the emerging patchwork of formidable regional trading blocs in Europe and America is causing fear of economic isolation in many Asian economies. Driven by challenges of globalization and growing economic interdependence in Asia, both ASEAN and India are actively pursuing free trade agreements with their trading partners within and outside the region. China's emergence as a trade and investment powerhouse and its entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO), affecting competitiveness in exports and foreign direct investment (FDI), have further contributed to the need for closer economic integration with trading partners. The inherent limitations of building up liberalized multilateral trade and the recent collapse of WTO talks in Cancun have added urgency to the process. India has existing free trade agreements (FFA) with Sri Lanka and Nepal and has recently signed a framework agreement towards establishing a FTA with Thailand and is negotiating FTAs with many countries including Singapore. (1) ASEAN has signed the framework agreements with China, Japan, and India to set up a free trade area within the next ten years, in addition to seeking bilateral FTAs, with Singapore taking the lead. India is ASEAN's summit partner along with China, Japan, and South Korea, After the initiation of India's Look East policy in the early 1990s, coinciding with economic reforms and liberalization, the ASEAN-India ties have grown from a sectoral dialogue partnership in 1992 to a full dialogue partnership in 1995 and subsequently to a summit-level interaction. The first ASEAN-India Summit was held in 2002 in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. The progressively closer relationship has led to the strengthening of not only economic ties between ASEAN and India, but also political and security linkages, with India joining the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in 1996. ASEAN-India partnership aims at exploiting complementarities and synergies in terms of factor endowments, economic structure, and skills and capabilities in diverse areas such as information technology, pharmaceuticals, tourism, entertainment, human resource development, education, research in biotechnology, power, food processing, agriculture, healthcare, financial services, communication, space technology, energy security, industrial parks, real estate management, logistics, infrastructure, and so on. Over the last few years, collaborative initiatives (2) have been launched between ASEAN and India in many of these sectors. Some of the joint projects like development of composites and rare earth magnets for industrial applications are now poised for commercial applications. Apart from merchandise trade, there are bidirectional flows between India and ASEAN in FDI, science and technology, tourism, and manpower. ASEAN's expansion to include countries of the Indochina region (Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam) enhances the scope for ASEAN-India partnership in the twenty-first century. ASEAN-10 (3) plus India can exploit a large enough market for their goods and services on the basis of their national and region wise competitive advantage (Wadhva 2000). Over the last decade, strong institutional mechanisms for ASEAN-India dialogue and cooperation have been put in place. Two India-ASEAN Business Summits, held in India during 2002 and 2003, have already brought together business people and officials from both sides to explore business and industry links. To spearhead co-operation in the private sector, an ASEAN-India Business Council (AIBC) comprising of representatives from ASEAN Chambers of Commerce and Industry and apex business organizations in India has been set up. …

Cultural policy‐making in the free trade era: an evaluation of the impact of current world trade organisation negotiations on audio‐visual industries

The delicate compromise concerning the regulation of world trade in audio‐visual materials is about to be upset. Ongoing negotiations under the World Trade Organisation's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) are seeking to establish, in the words of US negotiators, “clear, dependable and predictable trade rules” for transnational media exchanges. This article evaluates the impact of the GATS on audio‐visual industries and considers the extent to which cultural industries fit into the framework of multilateral trade talks. Based on interviews with trade officials in the WTO and the UK Department of Trade and Industry, the article concludes that liberalising and deregulatory policy shifts are more likely to emanate from corporate and state environments than from the slow and detailed negotiations in WTO headquarters in Geneva where “defensive” interests appear to be dominating over “offensive” ones.

The Innovative North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation

The North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation (the NACEC or CEC) is an innovative international environmental institution in three important ways. It is the first international organization created to address the environmental aspects of economic integration. It is a regional environmental institution with powerful tools and almost unlimited jurisdiction. And it provides unprecedented opportunities for participation by civil society at the international level. In each of these respects, the Commission addresses critical international concerns. The effort to reconcile environmental protection and economic integration has become one of the flashpoints of international discourse; although rarely raised before 1990, since then environmental objections to trade and investment agreements have nearly prevented ratification of the North American Free Trade Agreement, contributed to the abandonment of talks aimed at a Multilateral Agreement on Investment, and helped lead to the 1999 Seattle riots that accompanied the failed effort to begin a new round of World Trade Organization negotiations. At the same time, the international community has become more aware of the interdependence of ecological systems and the need for international institutions to protect the environment. Despite the proliferation of environment policies effectively and the handful of regional environmental organizations are relatively powerless. With respect to economic integration and environmental protection, as well as many other areas of international cooperation, nations are struggling to respond to the demands of their citizens to participate in the development and implementation of international policies that affect them. The Commission is important because it provides creative answers to each of these issues. Its answers may or may not prove satisfactory but, either way, the lessons to be drawn from its experience should be of great value to all those trying to reconcile environmental protection and economic integration, to promote stronger regional and global environmental organizations, and to find ways for civil society to participate in international policy. The agreement creating the CEC has already been used as a model for bilateral agreements between Canada and Chile and between the United States and Jordan. Surprisingly, however, the Commission has received relatively little scholarly attention. Although political scientists and lawyers have described its relationship to NAFTA and have analyzed its submissions procedure, there are few comprehensive analyses of how it is fulfilling, or failing to fulfill, its mandates. This book is intended to fill that gap.

Key Issues in the World Trade Organization Negotiations on Agriculture

Key Issues in the World Trade Organization Negotiations on Agriculture

Regional Agreements and the World Trade Organization Negotiations

during the last decades has been the expansion of regional trading agreements (RTAs), particularly in the Western Hemisphere and Europe. In the Americas, total trade grew at an average of 10.2% per year between 1990 and 2000, more than double the rate of extrahemispheric trade (4.4%), and the intra-trade share jumped from 48% to 61% of the total (Inter-American Development Bank). This has been related to several reasons, such as the spread of democracy in Latin America, which opened new opportunities for dialogue and collaboration, and the important changes in trade, macroeconomic, public sector, and regulatory policies that further promoted the integration of those countries in the world economy. In particular, there were important reductions of trade barriers, which took place multilaterally (as a result of GATT/WTO negotiations), regionally (as a consequence of different trade agreements in the American continent, such as NAFTA and MERCOSUR), and unilaterally. Currently there are ongoing discussions, initiated in 1994, to create a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) by 2005, as well as a host of other initiatives, including possible links between MERCOSUR and the European Union (EU), and the accession of Chile to NAFTA. On the other side of the Atlantic, the EU, itself the result of a wide-ranging process of economic and political integration, is pursuing the enlargement of the Union while, at the same time, negotiating and participating in several other trade agreements. Ten countries (Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, the Slovak Republic, and Slovenia) are likely to join the EU in 2004, whereas two other countries (Bulgaria and Romania) may join later in the decade. Trade agreements with these countries have been part of the Europe Agreements since 1992. In addition, the EU negotiated an FTA with South Africa in October 1999, signed the Cotonou Agreement (successor to previous Lom6 Conventions) with 77 African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) countries on June, 2000, and approved the Everything but Arms (EBA) Initiative on February 26, 2001. There are also other regi nal and bilateral trade agreements or initiatives with Turkey, Mexico, Mediterranean cou tries, Balkan countries, MERCOSUR, and others.

Developing Countries and the World Trade Organization Negotiations

There are few clearer indications of the widely perceived benefits to developing countries of more open trade than the subtitling of the current Doha Round of trade negotiations as The Development Round. This claim is not disputed in this paper. Rather, we join a strong consensus among economists that developing countries, particularly the poorest, have a great deal to gain from trade liberalization. Development requires growth, and greater access to world markets is a powerful necessary condition for more rapid growth. Therefore, poor countries have the most to gain from a more freely functioning world market. Clear arguments on this point are succinctly summarized in McCalla.

Food Security and Agricultural Protection in South Korea

South Korea has been pursuing food self‐sufficiency using high tariffs and high administrative prices in key agricultural and food markets. Using a dual approach to trade and trade restrictiveness indices, we analyze the impact of these market distortions on welfare and trade volume. Then, we compute second‐best distortions, which minimize the welfare cost of meeting observed levels of self‐sufficiency and production. We rationalize these second‐best distortions to what could be claimed as legitimate protection under a “food security” (FS) box in World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations. FS‐box protection is sensitive to changes in the definition and the extent of the FS objectives. We show that FS via production targets and reliance on imports would be more palatable to consumers and trade partners, while preserving income transfer to the farm sector.

Challenges Facing the World Trade Organization Negotiations on Agriculture

nities, and shed a spotlight on the WTO before it had transformed itself as an organization. The increased role and profile of the developing countries in the WTO represents another challenge for the organization. The WTO (and the Uruguay Round Agreement on Agriculture, URAA) was established to address producers' concerns, not consumer concerns. But consumers now drive the global food system. The power of the consumer, and emerging concerns over technology, production processes, and animal welfare, has brought intangibles into an organization ill-equipped to deal with them. The Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) agreement anticipated that safety regulations could be disguised as protectionism. But it did not anticipate the conflict over the definition of sound science and precaution. Nor did it anticipate that the issue under debate would not just be animal and plant health, but human health-a politically potent issue for any national government, much less a disembodied international organization. Nontrade concerns also arise outside the

Agricultural trade policies in the new millennium

Agricultural trade policies in the new millennium

Insurance and China's Entry Into the WTO

AbstractInsurance emerged as one of the most hotly debated issues regarding China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) as a result of both historical precedents and the potential for significant market growth. The new rules for insurance operations in China under the WTO will allow insurers more freedom to enter and operate in this market. This article provides an explanation of the history of insurance operations in China, the role of insurance in the WTO negotiation process, and the effect that membership in the WTO will have on insurance operations in China in the future.

Foreign Direct Investment: Trends, TRIMs, and WTO Negotiations

Foreign direct investment (FDI) flows have increased dramatically in recent decades. As developing countries, particularly in Asia, remove restrictions and implement policies to attract FDI inflows, trade and investment have become increasingly intertwined. As such, there have been growing calls for a multilateral framework of foreign investment rules to be negotiated under the auspices of the World Trade Organization (WTO). This paper reviews recent developments in FDI flows and their impacts in developing Asia, and the importance of the policy context in which those flows occur. It discusses advantages and disadvantages of including FDI in WTO negotiations, and related policy options for developing Asian economies.

Development, trade, and the WTO: a handbook

Developing countries are increasingly confronted with the need to address trade policy related issues in international agreements, most prominently the World Trade Organization (WTO). New WTO negotiations on a broad range of subjects were launched in November 2001. Determining whether and how international trade agreements can support economic development is a major challenge. Stakeholders in developing countries must be informed on the issues and understand how their interests can be pursued through international cooperation. This handbook offers guidance on the design of trade policy reform, surveys key disciplines and the functioning of the World Trade Organization (WTO), and discusses numerous issues and options that confront developing countries in using international cooperation to improve domestic policy and obtain access to export markets. Many of the issues discussed are also relevant in the context of regional integration agreements. Separate sections of the handbook summarize what constitutes sound trade policy; the major aspects of the WTO from a development perspective; policy issues in the area of merchandise trade and the liberalization of international transactions in services; protection of intellectual property rights and economic development; new regulatory subjects that are emerging in the agenda of trade talks; and enhancing participation of developing countries in the global trading system.

Multifunctionality and Agricultural Trade Negotiations

Differing views of multifunctionality—attributing nonmarket benefits to agricultural production—continue to be an obstacle in World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiations. Some nations see multifunctionality as justifying subsidies to agricultural production; others see it as disguised protection. This paper shows that while multifunctionality never justifies trade interventions, it can justify production subsidies or taxes. Recognizing that the subsidies or taxes can be economically efficient policies, nations must precisely define and value the externalities in order to design policies and defend those interventions in the WTO. Trade rules are developed that accommodate domestic policy intervention while preventing disguised protection.

Agriculture, the EC and the WTO: A Legal Critical Analysis of the Concepts of Sustainability and Multifunctionality

The agricultural policies of the Member States of the EC have for many years now been controlled from Brussels under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). In recent years the CAP has, together with other policies of the EC, been refocused from crop production support to a European rural policy, with the term ‘sustainability’ being written into many policy documents. This term has achieved international recognition and the definition used by the Brundtland Commission has been widely accepted, as evidenced by its use in OECD documentation. While the term ‘sustainability’ has been written into World Trade Organisation (WTO) texts, the robustness of the term is questionable. The question then arises as to the legal interaction of WTO texts and multilateral environmental agreements, which do have ‘sustainability’ as their core philosophy. A new term has entered the regional and global debate in the policy area of agriculture, that of ‘multifunctionality’. The EC is increasingly defining agriculture as being multifunctional. This term has yet to be clearly defined at EC level, although the OECD has done some work in this area. How the millennium round of WTO negotiations reacts to the term ‘multifunctionality’ will have an important impact on the EC's CAP. This paper examines the issues of sustainability and multifunctionality, with particular reference to the agricultural policies of the EU and WTO, and their interaction.

Developing Countries and a New Round of WTO Negotiations

This article summarizes some of the results and findings emerging from an ongoing World Bank research and capacity-building project that focuses on the World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiating agenda from a developing country perspective. Recent research suggests that the potential gains from further multilateral liberalization of trade remain very large. The payoffs associated with attempts to introduce substantive disciplines in the WTO on domestic regulatory regimes are much less certain. This suggests that the focus of current and future negotiations should be primarily on the bread and butter of the multilateral trading system-the progressive liberalization of barriers to trade in goods and services on a nondiscriminatory basis. In addition, priority should be given to ensuring that rules are consistent with the development needs of poorer countries and to helping developing countries implement WTO obligations.

Agricultural multifunctionality in the WTO—legitimate non-trade concern or disguised protectionism?

The extent to which the multifunctionality of agriculture can justify continuing domestic subsidies to farmers that may be trade distorting in their effects, has emerged as a key bone of contention in the current World Trade Organization (WTO) agriculture trade talks. Supporters of multifunctionality point to the contribution of agriculture in terms of food security, rural development and environmental protection. In this paper, we focus on the environmental component in order to examine three interconnected questions. First, how robust is multifunctionality as a policy concept? Second, if multifunctionality is a reality, how valid is the claim made by European negotiators that the liberalization of agricultural policy and the abolition of blue box subsidies threaten the joint production of food and environmental goods in rural space? Third, what are the precise implications of this analysis for agri-environmental policy design, and the likely compatibility of the European Union's favoured model with current and future WTO disciplines? We conclude that, while multifunctionality is a genuine, and in some respects, unique, feature of European agriculture, it is in relation to the perceived threat of extensive agricultural restructuring to biodiversity and landscape values in the European Union that the concept has been most fully realized. This has profound implications for policy design, suggesting a need to retain some element of income support in the policy mix in order to defend environmental assets against the extreme consequences of farm structural change. We conclude by exploring what these deductions might mean for the future course of the WTO talks and for the long-term design of agri-environmental policy in industrialized countries.

The Rising Tide of Green Unilateralism in World Trade Law. Options for Reconciling the Emerging North–South Conflict

In recent years, tensions between environment and trade policies have significantly increased, fuelled by a host of trade disputes over issues as diverse as tuna, shrimps, automobiles, furs, or meat of cattle treated with certain growth hormones.1 In these and many other cases, some States wanted to ban the import on environmental grounds, while exporting States invoked their rights of non-discrimination in trade granted under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)2 and other agreements under the World Trade Organization (WTO).3 A central issue in this conflict is the legitimacy of unilateral action and national decision-making under WTO law, as opposed to multilateral decision-making. A second line of conflict— often indistinguishable from the first—runs between the governments of the large developed markets in the North, with their strong environmentalist movements, and the smaller trading nations, in particular in the developing world. Many industrialised countries want to place the environment and trade nexus on the agenda of future WTO negotiations, with the intention of bringing environmental standards into the WTO legal framework or of opening up additional avenues for unilateral action.4 In contrast, many governments and non-governmental organisations

Behind China's World Trade Organization agreement with the USA

The Sino-US agreement regarding China's accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in late 1999 came as a surprise to many observers. How and why did the Chinese reach the agreement in view of the impasses in the negotiation that occurred earlier in the year? These impasses included the collapse of the WTO talks during Zhu's visit to the USA in April, the NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade in May, and the deadlock between the Chinese and US negotiators in November. Drawing on published sources as well as experts' insights, this paper examines the Chinese leadership's decision-making process and its reasons for concluding the agreement. It suggests that the exclusive decision-making circle of top Chinese leaders circumvented the opposition to the agreement and facilitated the negotiations. These leaders, especially Jiang and Zhu, favoured an agreement because they believed WTO membership could improve China's international relations, trade conditions, the outcomes of reform at home, and China's leverage over Taiwan. The closed decision making on the WTO also left the Chinese leaders with a challenging task: educating officials and the population about the WTO rules and possible impacts while ensuring that they abide by the rules.

Trade Reform and the Corn Market: Prospects for the World Trade Organization Negotiations on Agriculture

Government support and trade restrictions on agricultural commodities are among the most globally distorting protectionist policies. This is especially true with regards to corn. Vast production subsidies and import barriers, primarily within the European Union and China, have artificially inflated the global supply of this commodity, while restricting the available consumer markets. This impact is augmented by the preferential treatment granted in these countries to the production and importation of the best available substitute to corn, soybeans. Using an econometric model with commodity data over the past 20 years, this article predicts the likely impact of potential World Trade Organization (WTO) trade pacts on these corn trade distortions. Despite the WTO setbackin Seattle, the vast global benefits resulting from agricultural trade liberalization in corn alone validate a continued push towards freer trade.