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TWN
Info Service on WTO and Trade Issues (Jun25/13) Geneva 17 Jun (D. Ravi Kanth) — The chair of the Doha services negotiations at the World Trade Organization has suggested how the stalled negotiations could be rejuvenated, despite the continued headwinds facing the global trade body and the multilateral trading system, which appear “to lie in ruins” due to the Trump administration’s continued assault on global trade, said people familiar with the development. “The only thing it maybe requires is not to rule out, beforehand, any negotiation, under any circumstance,” the chair of the Council for Trade in Services in Special Session, Ambassador Adamu Mohammed Abdulhamid of Nigeria, wrote in a report circulated to WTO members last week. In a restricted report (TN/S/W/65) issued on 12 June, Ambassador Abdulhamid said that he consulted “a large majority of the membership,” including bilaterally with some countries, so as to make his assessment on the state of play and how to restart the stalled services negotiations. The mandated Doha services negotiations since the WTO’s 6th ministerial conference held in Hong Kong-China on 13-18 December 2005 remain stalled due to the alleged failure of the industrialized countries, particularly the United States, to deliver even on a services waiver for the least-developed countries (LDCs), said people familiar with the negotiations. According to present and former trade envoys, once the Trade Facilitation Agreement, a top priority for the US, was concluded by the industrialized countries at the WTO’s 9th ministerial conference in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2013, they simply walked out from the mandated negotiations in agriculture and other areas, including services. For example, the Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration of 2005 sets out the mandate on services in paragraphs 25-27, as well as a detailed Annex C, which sets out the objectives, approaches and timelines to the negotiations. Paragraph 25 states: “The negotiations on trade in services shall proceed to their conclusion with a view to promoting the economic growth of all trading partners and the development of developing and least-developed countries, and with due respect for the right of Members to regulate. In this regard, we recall and reaffirm the objectives and principles stipulated in the GATS, the Doha Ministerial Declaration, the Guidelines and Procedures for the Negotiations on Trade in Services adopted by the Special Session of the Council for Trade in Services on 28 March 2001 and the Modalities for the Special Treatment for Least-Developed Country Members in the Negotiations on Trade in Services adopted on 3 September 2003, as well as Annex C of the Decision adopted by the General Council on 1 August 2004.” Paragraph 26 states: “We urge all Members to participate actively in these negotiations towards achieving a progressively higher level of liberalization of trade in services, with appropriate flexibility for individual developing countries as provided for in Article XIX of the GATS. Negotiations shall have regard to the size of economies of individual Members, both overall and in individual sectors. We recognize the particular economic situation of LDCs, including the difficulties they face, and acknowledge that they are not expected to undertake new commitments.” Yet, 20 years after the Hong Kong ministerial conference, “it seems like deja vu,” said several people familiar with the negotiations. CHAIR’S REPORT The chair’s report appears to be an appeal to members to revitalize the work, even if it is on a somewhat modest framework. Expressing his sincere hope, the chair suggested “key takeaways” to members that can “help facilitate your deliberations on future work and contribute to forging a path forward.” “Among the delegations that I have met so far, I think that there is recognition of the growing importance of services in world trade and the need to respond to the call of Ministers at MC13 to reinvigorate work in the Special Session,” said Ambassador Abdulhamid. In paragraph 18 of the Abu Dhabi Ministerial Declaration adopted at the WTO’s 13th ministerial conference (MC13) in Abu Dhabi on 2 March 2024, trade ministers acknowledged “the need to facilitate the increased participation of developing Members, including LDCs, in global services trade, paying particular attention to sectors and modes of supply of export interest to them.” The ministers also acknowledged “the importance of the work undertaken in the Council for Trade in Services (in regular and special session) and its subsidiary bodies and commit to reinvigorate work on trade in services within the mandate of the GATS and other existing mandates including through further thematic, evidence-based discussions.” In his report, the chair suggested that “some [members] were uncertain about how this might best be done, including because of the current global trade environment, while others had more specific ideas to help advance work in the context of the mandate agreed by all under Article XIX of the GATS.” Paragraph 1 of Article XIX of the GATS states that: “In pursuance of the objectives of this Agreement, Members shall enter into successive rounds of negotiations, beginning not later than five years from the date of entry into force of the WTO Agreement and periodically thereafter, with a view to achieving a progressively higher level of liberalization. Such negotiations shall be directed to the reduction or elimination of the adverse effects on trade in services of measures as a means of providing effective market access. This process shall take place with a view to promoting the interests of all participants on a mutually advantageous basis and to securing an overall balance of rights and obligations.” The chair, however, did not refer to the Doha ministerial mandate, nor the Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration, in what appears to be an attempt “to bury” the previous ministerial mandates, said negotiators from developing countries. SOME SUGGESTIONS In his report, Ambassador Abdulhamid shared “some of the suggestions made by different Members.” The first three suggestions include bringing the market access commitments made in regional trade agreements such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) into the services negotiations. The chair said: “A suggestion repeated by various delegations was to undertake work and to have dedicated discussions on market access achieved in regional trade agreements on services.” On this same issue, the chair said that “different suggestions were made”, including “to assess levels of market access bound, to discuss Members’ experiences, and to see how development aspects had been addressed in that context”. Further, “a motivation was that this would provide useful insights on what might, at least in part, be harvested in a WTO negotiation, and how much of a difference this would make in comparison to what is currently bound under the GATS.” “There were also suggestions to start with certain sectors,” the chair said, adding that, “Others suggested to look at rules in RTAs [regional trade agreements] that support market access commitments, and which could figure in schedules as additional commitments, for example, on exclusive suppliers or competition, among others.” In a similar vein, “another suggestion put forward by some was to look at applied regimes, to highlight key trends in relation to market access measures, draw comparisons across sectors and modes, and to discuss the distance with bound regimes,” the chair said. He indicated that some members sought to look “for RTAs” because they could offer “key pieces of evidence, knowledge sharing and discussions that would be needed to be able to properly assess the situation and carry out the mandate under Article XIX.” The chair said some members “suggested streams of work focused on trade in value-added and on the role of services inputs in goods production and exports and, more broadly, the role of services and services market access in supply chains and in the transfer of technology and knowledge.” Without naming the members, the chair said that “others suggested to focus TN/S/W/65 on certain specific sectors or the impact of technical developments and the rise of digital services and cross-border supply.” Many delegations underscored “the need to provide market access in sectors and modes of interest to developing countries,” the chair said. There was also a suggestion “to organize dedicated sessions on different elements of preparatory work, including with different regional focuses,” he added. The chair said that several members “also expressed appreciation for the papers and exchanges on the different sectors in the context of exploratory discussions on market access after MC11, and they hoped that this could continue.” According to the chair’s report, delegations “often called for Secretariat support and analysis for the discussion of the topics I just mentioned.” India, for example, had sought a Secretariat report on the compliance by members with Mode 4 commitments under the GATS (concerning the movement of short-term services providers), but so far, the Secretariat has “dodged the issue”, said people familiar with the services negotiations. According to the chair, some members “also suggested that the Secretariat update the sectoral background notes so as to provide an information base for discussions.” He said it is clear that “some of the proposed work could be carried out in the short term, while other aspects might involve a longer time span,” while building “an agenda that included items of interest to different groups of Members.” The chair said it is his feeling “that a number of the proposed avenues of work, though not always formulated that way, would seem to be in line with work on the “assessment of trade in services”, which is spelled out in Article XIX.” Even though the services negotiations are being conducted under the ambit of the Doha Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC), the chair said somewhat misleadingly that “the Special Session was established to carry out work under Article XIX, including the assessment.” “Article XIX mentions that an assessment of trade in services shall be carried out in overall terms and on a sectoral basis with reference to the objectives of this Agreement, including those set out in paragraph 1 of Article IV on the increasing participation of developing countries,” the chair noted. He stressed that “the assessment of trade in services does not prejudge negotiations under Article XIX. It does not bind countries to engage in negotiations. The only thing it maybe requires is not to rule out, beforehand, any negotiation, under any circumstance. From the consultations, I think there was a good level of support for assessment-related work, or what some have also called a stocktaking.” Commenting on the WTO’s upcoming 14th ministerial conference (MC14), to be held in Yaounde, Cameroon, on 26-29 March 2026, the chair said it appears that “some delegations expressed interest in using this opportunity to report back and seek further guidance in view of the language included in the Ministerial Declaration at MC13.” He said that other members “stressed that the Ministerial was not an endpoint given the built-in mandate, and preferred focusing efforts on starting work, arguing that any MC14 language should reflect the state of discussions.” According to the chair’s report, there was “strong support from various developing countries for an information session by the Secretariat on earlier work and discussions under Article XIX and in the Special Session for the background of interested Geneva-based delegates.” +
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