About the WTO
Canada - Additional Duties on Certain Products from the United States
On 11 July 2019 the WTO circulated two panel report in the cases brought by the United States in “Canada — Additional Duties on Certain Products from the United States” (DS557) and “Mexico — Additional Duties on Certain Products from the United States” (DS560).
On the Effectsof GATT/WTO Membership on Trade
We capitalize on the latest developments in the empirical structural gravity literature to revisit the question of whether and how much does GATT/WTO membership affect international trade. We are the first to capture the non-discriminatory nature of GATT/WTO commitments by measuring the effects of GATT/WTO membership on international trade relative to domestic sales.
Introduction
This publication concerns the legal instruments drawn up by WTO Members in relation to the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization (WTO Agreement) and the Multi- and Plurilateral Trade Agreements annexed to that Agreement.
WTO Members
Currently the WTO has 164 Members. They are listed in the table below according to their designated full names as of the date of membership or according to the names as subsequently submitted to the WTO Secretariat. In line with the practice of the WTO Secretariat the remaining sections of this publication use the short names of Members as listed in the latest revision to document WT/INF/43/Rev.22 except in the titles of relevant accession protocols.
Status of WTO Legal Instruments
This publication covers the treaty instruments drawn up by WTO Members in relation to the Agreement Establishing the WTO and the multilateral and plurilateral trade agreements annexed to this Agreement. It lists the signature dates of WTO agreements and the dates of acceptance or amendments to these agreements. It also provides the date of their entry into force as well as for other communications and declarations received by the WTO Director-General in his capacity as depositary. This publication reflects several WTO accessions and treaty amendments since the previous edition. Following a brief introduction a dedicated section provides a comprehensive summary of the establishment of the WTO and the evolution of its treaty instruments. It also provides information on depositary notifications by the WTO Director-General the relevant volumes of the WTO and UN Treaty Series and treaty registration with the United Nations. Hyperlinks in the PDF allow readers direct access to the relevant WTO and UN documents.
United States - Certain Measures Relating to the Renewable Energy Sector
On 27 2019 June the WTO circulated the panel report in the case brought by India in “United States - Certain Measures Relating to the Renewable Energy Sector” (DS510).
How the WTO is structured
Below this is the General Council (normally ambassadors and heads of delegation in Geneva and sometimes officials sent from members’ capitals) which meets several times a year in the Geneva headquarters. The General Council also meets as the Trade Policy Review Body and the Dispute Settlement Body.
Supporting development and building trade capacity
The Committee on Trade and Development continued work on the link between trade and development as instructed by trade ministers. They considered possible future work for the Committee on electronic commerce and continued discussion of duty-free and quota-free market access for least-developed countries (LDCs). They also discussed the monitoring mechanism for special and differential treatment (S&D) for developing countries in WTO agreements and decisions.
Secretariat and budget
The WTO’s recruitment activity remains high with 41 vacancies filled in 2018. In 2018 the number of staff increased slightly to 627 from 625 the previous year. WTO Secretariat staff come from 84 WTO members up from 83 previously.
Outreach
Hosted at the request of the private sector the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) and B20 Argentina the business arm of the G20 the one-day meeting drew participants from small and large enterprises from developed developing and least-developed countries and a variety of sectors.
Trade negotiations and discussions
In 2018 WTO members sought practical and constructive ways to move trade negotiations forward. The Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) Chair Director-General Roberto Azevêdo said that if members are to deliver substantive outcomes it cannot be business as usual. Members need to reflect in an active way. There will be different needs and results in different negotiating groups and it is up to members to determine with the respective chairs the appropriate path. It is important that pledges of support for the system are matched with deeds.
Implementation and monitoring
The General Council agreed that the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference will take place in Nur-Sultan Kazakhstan on 8-11 June 2020. Thanking the Kazakhstan Government for its invitation DG Azevêdo said: “Coming from one of the newest WTO members this is powerful.”
Annual Report 2019
The WTO’s Annual Report 2019 provides a comprehensive account of the organization’s activities in 2018 and early 2019. The Report opens with a message from Director-General Roberto Azevêdo and a brief overview of the year. This is followed by in-depth accounts of the WTO’s main areas of activity over the past 12 months.
Women’s Economic Empowerment
Aid for Trade supports developing and least-developed countries in building their trade capacity and in increasing their exports by turning market access opportunities into market presence. It does so by addressing four key areas: trade policy & regulations; economic infrastructure; building productive capacity; and trade-related adjustment.
Trade Policies Supporting Women’s Economic Empowerment
This paper looks at the various trade policies WTO Members have put into place to foster women’s economic empowerment. The analysis below is based on the information provided by WTO Members as part of their Trade Policy Review (TPRs) process from 2014 to 2018. Reports from the WTO Secretariat governments as well as the question and answer sessions were examined for the purpose of this paper.
WTO Ministerial Conferences
Key outcomes from WTO Ministerial Conferences since the organization was established in 1995.
How WTO Commitments Tame Uncertainty
Guided by a cost benefit analysis model and using a unique database of tariff bindings for all WTO countries over the 1996-2011 period we show that WTO commitments affect members’ trade policy. More stringent bindings reduce the likelihood of responding to import shocks by raising tariffs and increase the likelihood of contingent measures. We argue that this reduces overall trade policy uncertainty. In a counterfactual scenario where WTO members can arbitrarily increase tariffs they are 4.5 times more likely to do so than under current bindings.
China - Tariff Rate Quotas for Certain Agricultural Products
On 18 April 2019 the WTO circulated the panel report in the case brought by the United States in “China - Tariff Rate Quotas for Certain Agricultural Products” (DS517).
United States - Anti-Dumping Measures Applying Differential Pricing Methodology to Softwood Lumber from Canada
On 9 April 2019 the WTO circulated the panel report in the case brought by Canada in “United States - Anti-Dumping Measures Applying Differential Pricing Methodology to Softwood Lumber from Canada” (DS534).
Russia - Measures Concerning Traffic in Transit
On 5 April 2019 the WTO circulated the panel report in the case brought by Ukraine in “Russia - Measures Concerning Traffic in Transit” (DS512).
Product Patents and Access to Innovative Medicines in a Post-TRIPS era
This WTO working paper studies availability and affordability of new and innovative pharmaceuticals in a post-TRIPS era. The WTO’s TRIPS Agreement (TRIPS) makes it obligatory for WTO members– except least-developed country members (LDCs) - to provide pharmaceutical product patents with a 20-year protection term. Developing country members other than LDCs were meant to be compliant with this provision of TRIPS by 2005.
Potential Economic Effects of a Global Trade Conflict
The WTO Global Trade Model is employed to project the medium-run economic effects of a global trade conflict. The trade conflict scenario is based on recent estimates in the literature of the difference between cooperative and non-cooperative tariffs.
United States - Measures Affecting Trade in Large Civil Aircraft (Second Complaint) (Boeing - Airbus) - Recourse 1
On 28 March 2019 the WTO’s Appellate Body issued its report on US compliance in the dispute brought by the European Union in “United States — Measures Affecting Trade in Large Civil Aircraft — Second complaint” (DS353).
The welfare effects of trade policy experiments in quantitative trade models
This paper compares the solution methods and baseline calibration of three different quantitative trade models (QTMs): computable general equilibrium (CGE) models structural gravity (SG) models and models employing exact hat algebra (EHA). The different solution methods generate identical results on counterfactual experiments if baseline trade shares or baseline trade costs are identical.
Distance, Formal and Informal Institutions in International Trade
This paper brings together three strands of literature on the determinants of international trade – distance formal and informal institutions – to explain differences in export performance across countries. Using an augmented gravity model we find that the importance of formal institutions (rule of law) for bilateral trade increases with distance.
Services Trade Policy, WTO Commitments, and their Role in Economic Development and Trade Integration
Services have long been perceived as playing a secondary role in world trade. In particular the role of services trade policies and multilateral services commitments often tends to be downplayed. However in value added terms services account for about 50% of world trade and are significant in exports of countries of all levels of development.
China - Domestic Support for Agricultural Producers
On 28 February 2019 the WTO circulated the panel report in the case brought by the United States in “China — Domestic Support for Agricultural Producers” (DS511)
Appellate Body annual report for 2018
Annual reports on the work of the Appellate Body and its Secretariat have been issued since 2003. These reports contain information about the composition of the Appellate Body the appeals filed and the Appellate Body reports circulated during the period covered as well as technical assistance and other developments. The annual reports also provide up-to-date information on a range of topics relating to appellate proceedings including the subject matter of disputes and procedural issues raised in appeals as well as statistics on the WTO agreements addressed the percentage of panel reports appealed and the participation of WTO Members in appeals. It also contains key speeches delivered by AB Members during the covered period.
Acknowledgements
This publication was prepared by Arti Gobind Daswani Roy Santana and János Volkai of the WTO Secretariat with the support of WTO Deputy Director-General Karl Brauner Valerie Hughes (former Director of the WTO’s Legal Affairs Division) Suja Rishikesh Mavroidis (Director of the WTO Market Access Division) and John Adank (Director of the Legal Affairs Division). Special acknowledgment is owed to William Castro of the WTO’s Young Professionals Programme for his contributions to the processing of the data and preparation of the one-page case summaries to WTO staff members Jesse Kreier and Olga Falgueras Alamo from the Rules Division for their contribution to the compilation of relevant documents and to Jesse Nicol from the Appellate Body Secretariat for his comments. The authors are also grateful to Laoise Ní Bhriain Maria Bressi and Bryson Strupp from the Archives Section of the WTO Information Management Services for their active collaboration in checking the archives and identifying relevant information and to Tan Albayrak intern at the Legal Affairs Division for assisting in the final editing of the onepage case summaries.
Foreword by the Director-General
The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade is the world’s first general multilateral trade agreement. It was signed in 1947 and came into force on 1 January 1948. As the contracting parties began to implement what is more widely known as the GATT 1947 it is unlikely they would have foreseen the full magnitude of the political and economic importance of their accord and its enduring impact as a fundamental framework for multilateral trade right up to the present day.
Acknowledgements/Disclaimer
This publication was prepared by Arti Gobind Daswani Roy Santana and János Volkai of the WTO Secretariat with the support of WTO Deputy Director-General Karl Brauner Valerie Hughes (former Director of the WTO’s Legal Affairs Division) Suja Rishikesh Mavroidis (Director of the WTO Market Access Division) and John Adank (Director of the Legal Affairs Division). Special acknowledgment is owed to WTO staff members Jesse Kreier and Olga Falgueras Alamo from the Rules Division for their contribution to the compilation of relevant documents.
Investment Provisions in Preferential Trade Agreements: Evolution and Current Trends
Our analysis covers 230 PTAs of which 111 contain substantive provisions on investment. Over the past 60 years or so States have created an extensive network of Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs) that govern and protect international investment. The number of BITs concluded annually continues to increase although this rate has tapered off over the past decade.
One-page case summaries
A one-page case summary is devoted to each of the 316 GATT disputes identified by this publication.