Despite the postponement of the 12th Ministerial Conference (MC) due to start on 30 November in Geneva, some 67 members of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) have finalised a landmark agreement on domestic regulation of services that cuts red tape around licensing and qualifications.
The initiative of these countries, which represent more than 90% of world trade in services, was announced on Thursday (02.12.2021). This celebrated agreement seeks to improve the business climate, reduce business costs and bureaucracy to facilitate trade in services worldwide, according to the WTO statement.
In this regard, the Director General, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala He said from Geneva that this agreement “will save businesses, especially small businesses, $150.000 billion a year in costs according to research by the WTO and the OECD. It improves WTO rule-making and shows that the Organization is up and running.”
“The new disciplines, which cover licensing and qualification requirements and procedures, as well as technical standards, aim to make the internal processes that regulate the authorization to provide a service clearer, more predictable, transparent and not excessively burdensome. The result of these negotiations will be applied on a most favored nation basis, which means that it will benefit all WTO members,” the WTO reported.
A novelty for the WTO context is that the text contains a provision on the nondiscrimination between men and women in the framework of authorisation procedures for service providers
The achievement of this innovative and historic agreement, which will reduce costs for service providers and support the economic empowerment of women, represents a significant victory for the WTO, demonstrating that it can create trade rules fit for the 21st century.
It is worth mentioning that this process of national regulation of services is one of several “Joint Declaration Initiatives” launched at the 11th Ministerial Conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in December 2017, by groups of WTO members, with other initiatives covering topics such as investment facilitation for development, electronic commerce and micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs).
The participating WTO members in the talks are: Albania; Germany; Saudi Arabia, Kingdom of; Argentina; Australia; Austria; Belgium; Brazil; Bulgaria; Canada; Chile; China; Colombia; Costa Rica; Croatia; Cyprus; Czech Republic; Denmark; El Salvador; Estonia; European Union; Finland; France; Greece; Hong Kong, China; Hungary; Iceland; Ireland; Israel; Italy; Japan; Kazakhstan; Latvia; Liechtenstein; Lithuania; Luxembourg; Macedonia, Republic of; Malta; Mauritius; Mexico; Moldova, Republic of; Montenegro; Netherlands; New Zealand; Nigeria; Norway; Paraguay; Peru; Poland; Portugal; Romania; Singapore, Slovak Republic; Slovenia; Spain; United States; Sweden; Switzerland; Thailand; Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu; Turkey; Ukraine; and Uruguay.WTO Press Release)
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