Acerca de la OMC

Support for developing countries lies at the heart of the WTO’s activities. Much of the work in this area is coordinated by the Committee on Trade and Development, which commemorated its 100th session in 2016.

Rounds are a more controversial topic in the WTO period than they were in the GATT period. The eight that were conducted from the first Geneva Round in 1947 through the Uruguay Round of 1986 to 1994 provided the venues in which the great majority of all multilateral bargains were reached in the GATT system. That is true even for many of the accession negotiations, for while those talks were technically held outside the scope of a round, they often dovetailed with the larger initiative; acceding countries were permitted to engage in the multilateral negotiations, and the terms of their own accessions were often finalized as the end of a round. In the WTO period, by contrast, rounds have come under challenge in two ways. One is through the successes achieved outside of this structure, especially in the sectoral and other deals reached in the period that fell between the end of the Uruguay Round and the launch of the Doha Round. The other is through the apparent (though not definitive) failure of that latter round.

In 2015, the Trade Negotiations Committee and its subsidiary bodies focused on delivering meaningful outcomes for the Tenth Ministerial Conference in Nairobi in December. In the first half of the year, WTO members focused on preparing a post-Bali work programme. Although members ultimately failed to establish this programme, they redoubled efforts in the second half of the year to deliver substantive outcomes in Nairobi. Negotiations at the Ministerial Conference concluded with six ministerial decisions on agriculture, cotton and issues related to least developed countries, known collectively as the “Nairobi Package”. Ministers also issued a declaration on the future of the WTO and members’ divergent views on the Doha Round.

Since 2009, more than 5,000 support measures for a host of environmental objectives have been notified to the WTO.

En 2009, il a été fait appel de trois rapports de groupes spéciaux auprès de l'Organe d'appel, sur un total de cinq rapports susceptibles de faire l'objet d'un appel. L'un de ces appels portait sur des procédures de groupe spécial initial. Deux autres portaient sur des procédures de groupe spécial au titre de l'article 21 :5 (Surveillance de la mise en oeuvre des recommandations et décisions) du Mémorandum d'accord sur le règlement des différends (Mémorandum d'accord), concernant des affaires dans lesquelles les parties n'étaient pas d'accord sur le point de savoir si la décision initiale du groupe spécial avait été correctement mise en oeuvre.

En 2012, el Consejo General aprobó el conjunto de documentos de la adhesión de la República Democrática Popular Lao (Laos) y el de la adhesión de Tayikistán. Ambos países pasaron oficialmente a ser Miembros de la OMC a principios de 2013, tras haber notificado a la Organización que sus parlamentos habían ratificado sus respectivos Protocolos de Adhesión. En los Protocolos de Adhesión se recogen los compromisos asumidos respecto de todas las normas de la OMC.

In 2010 the work on Aid for Trade in the Committee on Trade and Development (CTD) focused on implementation of the 2010-11 Aid for Trade work programme, which embraces a wide range of partners and organizations. The WTO and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) also began preparations for the Third Global Review of Aid for Trade, planned for July 2011.

La OMC ha tenido seis directores generales desde su establecimiento. El primer Director General de la Organización fue Peter Sutherland, quien ocupó el cargo de enero a abril de 1995. Lo sucedieron Renato Ruggiero (1995-1999), Mike Moore (1999-2002) y Supachai Panitchpakdi (2002-2005). Pascal Lamy es el Director General que más tiempo ha estado en el puesto, desde 2005 hasta 2013. Roberto Azevêdo ocupó el cargo desde el 1 de septiembre de 2013 hasta el hasta agosto de 2020.

This book is a history in form but a biography in spirit. That term is technically inaccurate, as one cannot literally write the record of a life for something that does not live. To the extent that we can speak of the World Trade Organization (WTO) as if it were living, however, it is still young. In most of its members, the WTO would barely be of legal age to drink, drive and vote. It has nevertheless been around long enough to permit preliminary assessments of those events that have changed the composition of its membership and altered the ways that those members interact with one another. An underlying theme of this study is that the character of an international organization represents more than the sum of its parties, being the institutional embodiment of specific ideas and aspirations. The fact that the membership of the WTO is virtually identical to that of several other international organizations that deal with global economic issues does not mean that their members meet in these different institutions with identical aims or that they deal with one another in these forums in identical ways. In 18 years of practice, and in its inheritance from a half-century of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and two centuries of trade diplomacy before that, the WTO has received and developed a character that sets it apart from all other global institutions.

Il y a plusieurs manières de considérer l’Organisation mondiale du commerce. C’est une organisation qui s’occupe de l’ouverture commerciale. C’est une enceinte où les gouvernements négocient des accords commerciaux. C’est un lieu où ils règlent leurs différends commerciaux. C’est une organisation qui administre un ensemble de règles commerciales. L’OMC est essentiellement un lieu où les gouvernements Membres tentent de régler les problèmes commerciaux qui les opposent.

Historically, governments have intervened in the agriculture sector more than in other sectors. Agriculture was always covered by the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, which entered into force in 1948. But numerous exemptions meant agricultural trade escaped most of the disciplines that applied more generally to trade in industrial products. The result was the widespread use of measures that obstructed imports — import bans, limits on quantities that could be imported (quotas), high import duties, import duties whose rates varied and so created market uncertainty, minimum import prices, and various impediments not related to tariffs such as regulations and the activities of state trading enterprises. Major agricultural products such as cereals, meat, dairy, sugar and a range of fruits and vegetables faced trade barriers on a scale unseen in the rest of merchandise trade.

In Part II of this book, the authors discuss the accomplishments and future challenges facing the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its dispute settlement mechanism. In this chapter, I present my observations on the subject of East Asian participation in the dispute settlement mechanism of the WTO. By East Asia, I mean the region encompassing the five WTO Members of Northeast Asia (that is, Japan, China, Korea, Chinese Taipei, and Hong Kong, China) and the ten countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) (namely, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Viet Nam). As most countries in this region were latecomers to the multilateral trading system, their participation in the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) and its dispute settlement system was marginal. Their role in the WTO has increased considerably in all aspects of its work, including in its strengthened dispute settlement system. As most of the countries in East Asia are now WTO Members, their participation in the dispute settlement mechanism is likely to expand in the future.

En 2009, le Bureau de l'audit interne (BAI) a publié un rapport sur la politique de l'OMC en matière de voyages, a réalisé deux audits de suivi sur les achats, a examiné les pratiques actuelles en matière de délégation de pouvoir et a rédigé un projet de guide de la politique et des procédures en matière d'audit interne destiné au personnel.

El Programa de Cátedras OMC (PCO), que tiene por objeto respaldar y promover actividades académicas relacionadas con el comercio en universidades e instituciones de investigación de países en desarrollo y PMA, entró en su segunda fase en 2014 con la incorporación de 7 instituciones más al grupo de 14 que ya participaban en el Programa.

Lorsque le rapport de l’année dernière a été rédigé, il y avait un an seulement que la crise financière asiatique avait éclaté. À cette époque, on s’inquiétait encore beaucoup du risque de contagion et de grave récession. Une année plus tard, la situation est plus saine, mais seuls les optimistes invétérés contesteraient la nécessité de faire preuve de vigilance. Des problèmes importants subsistent et la reprise est loin d’être totale. La croissance du PIB au niveau mondial s’est fortement ralentie après avoir atteint un niveau record l’année précédente, cependant que la croissance du volume des échanges a diminué de plus de la moitié. Dans certaines parties de l’Asie, en raison d’un affaiblissement de la croissance de la production, la croissance du volume des importations est devenue négative. Les résultats économiques des autres régions ont contribué a maintenir une croissance de la production mondiale d’environ 2 pour cent et une croissance des exportations mondiales d’environ 4 pour cent en 1998. Aux États-Unis, l’expansion est demeurée exceptionnelle, contribuant pour une large part au chiffre global. Dans l’Union européenne, la progression a été moindre, mais supérieure à la moyenne mondiale.

The economies of least-developed countries (LDCs) had been steadily improving until the global economic meltdown in 2008 and are currently on the path of a faltering recovery. Growth is still being generated mainly by exports of raw materials and semi-processed products to the markets of developed countries and major emerging economies.

In 2015, the WTO received 16 new notifications about regional trade agreements (RTAs), down from 22 in 2014. The notifications involved eight new RTAs. Half of the RTAs were between developed and developing partners, maintaining a recent trend. The Asia Pacific region made the highest number of notifications – six RTAs – while the Americas made notifications about three RTAs. At the Tenth Ministerial Conference in Nairobi, ministers called for a discussion of the systemic implications of RTAs for the multilateral trading system.

Over the course of four meetings in 2011, the Council for Trade in Goods considered waivers on tariff commitments – collective extensions regarding the on-going harmonization of tariff schedules, and some individual requests – and discussed a number of trade concerns raised by WTO members.

La dixième Conférence ministérielle de l’OMC s’est tenue à Nairobi (Kenya) du 15 au 19 décembre 2015 et a été présidée par Mme Amina C. Mohamed (Kenya).