About the WTO

This publication contains the text of the WTO’s founding agreement, the 1994 Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization, and its Annexes, including all amendments and additions since its entry into force until September 2017. These include an amendment to the WTO’s intellectual property agreement (TRIPS Agreement) aimed at improving developing countries’ access to medicines, the WTO’s Trade Facilitation Agreement, which entered into force in February 2017, an amendment adopted in July 2017 to extend the frequency of peer review periods under the Trade Policy Review Mechanism as of 2019, and the amended Government Procurement Agreement. This publication updates and replaces The Legal Texts: The Results of the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations, which was first printed in 1994.

The Third Global Review of Aid for Trade, held on 18-19 July 2011, showed that traderelated assistance has helped to alleviate poverty by increasing export performance and employment. In 2009, Aid for Trade commitments reached approximately US$ 40 billion, a 60 per cent increase from the 2002-05 baseline period. However, the review also highlighted the need to measure the effectiveness of Aid for Trade and to ensure that it is always compatible with the goals of sustainable development.

The Appellate Body circulated reports in two disputes during 2013, both involving Canadian measures in the renewable energy sector. Canada had appealed the findings of the panel reports in both cases earlier in the year. One arbitration proceeding concerning the reasonable period of time for implementation of Dispute Settlement Body recommendations and rulings was carried out in 2013. Two members of the Appellate Body, Ricardo Ramírez-Hernández and Peter Van den Bossche, completed their first terms and were reappointed. David Unterhalter completed his second and final term. A new member of the Appellate Body will be appointed in 2014.

In 2013, the WTO received 35 new notifications of regional trade agreements (RTAs), down from 37 in 2012. The notifications involved 22 RTAs. Three of these were between developed partners, with another nine involving developed and developing partners. The remaining ten were between developing country partners. The Americas was the region with the highest number of notifications – 12 – followed by Europe with seven.

El Director General Roberto Azevêdo insistió en la necesidad de abordar los persistentes déficits de financiación del comercio para las pequeñas empresas en los países en desarrollo y se reunió con los responsables de las instituciones asociadas para examinar la manera de hacer frente al problema. En una nueva publicación de la OMC se analiza de qué forma se pueden abordar esos déficits de financiación. El Grupo de Expertos sobre Financiación del Comercio siguió evaluando las deficiencias de los mercados de financiación del comercio, especialmente en los países más pobres.

Countries generally resisted domestic pressures to erect trade barriers during 2012, although some of them put in place new trade-restrictive measures. Economic uncertainties and high levels of unemployment continued to feed domestic protectionist pressures. The global economy encountered increasingly strong headwinds during 2012 that hampered world trade and output growth. The WTO Secretariat revised downward its forecast for world trade growth in 2012 to 2.5 per cent from its forecast of 3.7 per cent early in the year.