Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 6 • Number 10 • 19th March 2002

Services: Members Agree To Further Extend ESM Deadline

Do More

Subscribe to Bridges

* required

Email Address: *

Country: *
Albania Algeria American Samoa Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua And Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas, The Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, Democractic Republic of the Cook Islands Costa Rica Cote D'Ivoire (Ivory Coast) Croatia (Hrvatska) Cuba Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic East Timor Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Islands Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon Gambia, The Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guam Guatemala Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard and McDonald Islands Honduras Hong Kong S.A.R. Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran Iraq Ireland Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea Korea, North Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Laos Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macau S.A.R. Macedonia, Former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Marshall Islands Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Micronesia Moldova Monaco Mongolia Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands Antilles Netherlands, The New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island Northern Mariana Islands Norway Oman Pakistan Palau Panama Papua new Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Island Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Qatar Reunion Romania Russia Rwanda Saint Helena Saint Kitts And Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent And The Grenadines Samoa San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia And The South Sandwich Islands Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard And Jan Mayen Islands Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syria Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania Thailand Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad And Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks And Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States United States Minor Outlying Islands Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Vatican City State (Holy See) Venezuela Vietnam Virgin Islands (British) Virgin Islands (US) Wallis And Futuna Islands Yemen Yugoslavia Zambia Zimbabwe

Employment Sector: *

First Name:

Last Name:

Organisation:

Enter the letters shown above:*

Download this issue

See also

Over the past week, WTO Members met for a series of services-related meetings as part of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) work programme. After a final 2-day delay on a decision on the extension of a deadline for the establishment of an emergency safeguard mechanism (ESM) for the GATS WTO Members agreed on 15 March to prolong the period for negotiating such an instrument until 15 March 2004. In the GATS subsidiary bodies, Members mainly discussed how to organise and advance future work of the Working Party on Domestic Regulation (WPDR), the Working Party on GATS Rules (WPGR), and the Committee on Specific Commitments (CSC) so as to avoid replication of work undertaken at the special sessions of the Council for Trade in Services (CTS).

The extension of the EMS deadline, originally proposed by the Services Council Chair, was supported inter alia by the EC, Mexico, Brazil, Canada, New Zealand, Argentina, Korea, Japan and Turkey. The deadline had originally been mandated within the GATS Article X (Emergency Safeguard Measures) as being not later than three years after the entry into force of the WTO agreement (i.e. 1 January 1998). The deadline was most recently extended to 15 March 2002 (’guidelines’ paragraph 7) (see BRIDGES Weekly, 26 February 2002).

The new deadline had been suggested by the outgoing Chairperson of the Working Party on GATS Rules (WPGR), Mr. Hugo Cayrus from Uruguay, who also proposed in separate notes the addition of two further elements to the decision, i.e.: firstly, to use the opportunity of the Fifth WTO Ministerial to be held in 2003 to conduct a stock-taking exercise; and, secondly, to establish a work program for the WPGR on the organisation of its future work. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) group, which had originally called for a one-year prolongation of the deadline, finally accepted the Chair’s proposal under the condition that the second additional element be modified: "The Chair will carry out consultations in order to establish" a program structuring future work of the Working Party. Members finally agreed to the two-year option together with the modified Chair’s notes. As an ASEAN source commented, ASEAN Members welcome this compromise provided that "Members get down to business now." The ASEAN group is a key demandeur for an ESM and therefore sought a short extension so as to accelerate the ESM negotiation process. Ideally, one trade source said, the outgoing Chair Mr. Cayrus would now commence informal consultations with Members on the work programme in order to come up with draft proposals in the next services cluster scheduled for the end of May. "Members have no time to lose" in the ESM negotiations, the source added.

Subsidiary bodies

According to observers, Members are currently in a phase of determining what the future role of the subsidiary bodies to the CTS will be. Following the 3 February decision of the Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) to hold the services negotiations in a special session of the CTS, the latter’s subsidiary bodies have recently been paralysed due to an overlap with CTS activities, as "Members do not want to duplicate their work", a trade source explained. Whereas some Members would like to see a further shift of discussions towards the special sessions of the CTS (CTS-SS), some point to the services negotiation guidelines which specify that "existing subsidiary bodies shall be utilised to their maximum capacity." As some sources cautioned, however, a relocation of the work done at the subsidiary bodies to the CTS-SS would not necessarily improve the pace of negotiations as the issues dealt with at the CTS-SS were so diverse that an in-depth discussion of specific subjects was hardly possible. Furthermore, there are concerns that in such a case issues would more likely be dealt with in the bilateral context, thereby undermining the multilateral nature of the process.

CSC

Observers regarded it as a positive signal that at an 11 March Committee on Specific Commitments (CSC) meeting, Australia as well as MERCOSUR submitted proposals for consideration by the CSC. Whereas Australia, on the one hand, tabled a supplement (S/CSS/W/67/Suppl.2; S/CSC/W/32, searchable at http://docsonline.wto.org/gen_search.asp) to its negotiating proposals on legal services (S/CSS/W/67, S/CSS/W/67/Corr.1 and S/CSS/W/67/Suppl.1/Rev.1), and MERCOSUR introduced its proposal on postal and courier services (S/CSS/W/108) which had already been discussed at the CTS, this development could, said one source, nevertheless be seen as an effort by some Members to shift work back to the subsidiary bodies.

WPDR

In an attempt to overcome the general lack of progress in the work of the subsidiary bodies, Members mainly discussed at a 12 March Working Party on Domestic Regulations (WPDR) meeting how to organise their future work. According to sources, Members were able to agree to "move away from the abstract and go to the concrete". This development was seen as an important step as Members had previously addressed the issues revolving around the GATS Article VI.4 debate — i.e. necessity and transparency in particular — from a rather theoretical and conceptual point of view (see BRIDGES Weekly, 4 December 2001). Members are now invited to submit examples and measures relating to those regulatory issues, which they potentially regard as trade barriers. With only four (informal) submissions by Members including Japan and the US, Members have so far been rather reluctant to engage in identifying practical examples for potentially trade-restricting domestic regulations as listed in Article VI.4. However, interventions by some Members, in particular Guyana, have recently demonstrated a renewed interest in a broader engagement in discussions.

Other issues

On 18 March, Members met at the CTS for a review of the GATS Annex on Air Transport Services. At present, most of the air transport sector — traffic rights and services directly related to traffic rights — is excluded from the coverage of the GATS. However, the GATS mandates a review by members of this situation. Talks have stalled, however, due to an impasse between a camp of countries promoting further liberalisation such as Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, and Chile on the one hand, and the US on the other. Therefore, at the 18 March meeting, the ‘liberalising’ group hinted at the possibility to take a plurilateral approach as e.g. chosen in the Agreement on Government Procurement (AGP) so as to move the process at least between the more proactive Members. Other Members took note of the proposal but requested more time to reflect. The date for the next review is not yet determined, but might take place in July, October or even in May next year.

Also on 18 March, Members convened in the Committee on Trade in Financial Services (CTFS) inter alia to review the acceptance of the Fifth Protocol to the GATS (see BRIDGES Weekly, 16 October 2001). The acceptance of seven Members is still pending, but both the Dominican Republic as well as Poland indicated that they may be able to finalise the ratification processes within the next six months.

For the current 19-22 March special session of the CTS (CTS-SS), the following submissions have been circulated for discussion at the three- day negotiating session:

- Proposal (supplement) by Australia on Legal Services (S/CSS/67/Suppl.2 and S/CSC/W/32)

- Proposal by EC on autonomous lib. (S/CSS/W/133) (see BRIDGES Weekly, 26 February 2002, http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/02-02- 26/story4.htm)

- Proposal by HK-China on autonomous liberalisation. (S/CSS/W/134)

- Proposal by Australia on Business Services other than legal services (S/CSS/W/135)

- Proposal by Australia on Distribution Services (S/CSS/W/136)

- Proposal by Japan on Education Services (S/CSS/W/137)

- Communication by Korea on MFN exemptions (S/C/W/204)

For an overview on the agenda of the CTS-SS, see BRIDGES Weekly, 26 February 2002). BRIDGES will report on the outcomes of the CTS-SS in its forthcoming issue.

See also WTO In Brief, this issue, on both a WTO and an NGO event on assessment of liberalisation in services trade.

"Trade: GATS Emergency Safeguards Talks To Be Extended?", SUNS, 14 March 2002. ICTSD Internal Files.