On the occasion of the 50th Anniversary of the multilateral trading system (GATT/WTO), the World Trade Organization (WTO) organized a symposium to discuss and analyze the current and future role of the world trading system. The rapid developments in the 1990s - not only political, but also economic and technological changes - have brought the WTO to a turning point in its existence. The new challenge, as the Director General stated in his opening remarks at the symposium, is not just to advance free trade against the forces of protectionism. The WTO's future agenda should also look at how investment and competition laws affect market access; whether differing labour or environmental standards confer a trade advantage and how this should be dealt with; whether taxation and innovation policies constitute a subsidy; whether governments should be allowed to regulate content on the Internet. These and other issues are a world away from "traditional" trade concerns such as tariffs or quotas, and yet all are included, in one form or another, on the new trade agenda. In this topical collection of essays, academics in international trade take a fresh look at the future of the global trading system and give an analysis of the new trade agenda.

The purpose of this book is to make the results of the Uruguay Round of Trade Negotiations easier to understand. The Uruguay Round, one of the longest and most complex economic negotiations ever undertaken, was completed successfully in December 1993. Its results are embodied in nearly 30 legal agreements and a large number of supplementary decisions, as well as a large number of highly detailed separate undertakings in which each country specifies the levels of trade restrictions, which it promises not to exceed, for thousands of different products or services. The joint agreements and decisions alone add up to well over 500 pages of printed text, and the individual undertakings, or schedules, bring the total volume of the results of the Uruguay Round to almost 300,000 pages. This formidable mass of paper embodies a total overhaul of the basic rules and institutions of world trade, and the birth of a new institution, the World Trade Organization.

The third edition of The WTO Dispute Settlement Procedures collects together the treaty texts, decisions and agreed practices relating to the procedures that apply in the settlement of WTO disputes. It affords ready answers to technical questions relating to matters such as: how disputes are initiated and conducted, including at the appellate stage; what deadlines apply and how to calculate them; what rules of conduct bind individuals involved in WTO dispute settlement; and what rules of procedure apply to meetings of the Dispute Settlement Body. This highly practical work, which includes cross-references and a subject index, will prove invaluable to anyone working in WTO dispute settlement, including lawyers, civil servants working in the field of trade, economists, academics and students. This edition has been fully updated to take account of revised rules and procedures.

In recent years the relationships between trade and the environment and trade and development have become increasingly complex. The need to reconcile the competing demands of economic growth, economic development, and environmental protection has become central to the multi-lateral trade agenda. In this volume various commentators debate the role of the World Trade Organization and other institutions in addressing these challenges. The book arises from the papers presented at two High Level Symposia hosted by the World Trade Organization in March 1999, on "Trade and the Environment" and "Trade and Development". The first section of the work focuses on the relationship between trade and the environment. The issues addressed include the need for WTO members to pursue integrated trade and environmental policies in order to achieve sustainable development, ways in which the removal of trade restrictions and distortions can lead to positive environmental and development solutions, the relationship between WTO provisions and trade measures contained in environmental agreements, and the need for transparency and effective interaction between civil society and the trade community. The second section examines the growing importance of developing countries in the global trading system over the last 30 years, and the ways in which the inequalities which persist between countries may be addressed. The papers include discussion of the need for integration of the least-developed countries into the multilateral trading system, the ways in which international institutions may work together to realize the objective of development, the complex role of trade liberalization in development, and the importance of new technologies in accelerating integration between developing and developed countries.

This is a detailed guide on how to read WTO Schedules of Commitments for Goods and Services. The Schedules are part of the Legal Texts of the WTO Uruguay Round Agreements. They comprise about 27,000 pages of specific commitments by 153 members of the WTO on market access conditions for their markets. Understanding how to interpret the Schedules is essential for anyone wishing to glean information for academic, official, or business purposes. Commissioned and reviewed by the WTO Secretariat, this is a unique guide to understanding the Schedules.

The third edition of The WTO Dispute Settlement Procedures collects together the treaty texts, decisions and agreed practices relating to the procedures that apply in the settlement of WTO disputes. It affords ready answers to technical questions relating to matters such as: how disputes are initiated and conducted, including at the appellate stage; what deadlines apply and how to calculate them; what rules of conduct bind individuals involved in WTO dispute settlement; and what rules of procedure apply to meetings of the Dispute Settlement Body. This highly practical work, which includes cross-references and a subject index, will prove invaluable to anyone working in WTO dispute settlement, including lawyers, civil servants working in the field of trade, economists, academics and students. This edition has been fully updated to take account of revised rules and procedures.

This is a detailed guide on how to read WTO Schedules of Commitments for Goods and Services. The Schedules are part of the Legal Texts of the WTO Uruguay Round Agreements. They comprise about 27,000 pages of specific commitments by 153 members of the WTO on market access conditions for their markets. Understanding how to interpret the Schedules is essential for anyone wishing to glean information for academic, official, or business purposes. Commissioned and reviewed by the WTO Secretariat, this is a unique guide to understanding the Schedules.

This work brings together the background papers on major service sectors prepared by the WTO Secretariat for the WTO's Council for Trade in Services, in preparation for the new round of negotiations which started in January 2000. Following an analysis of the economic effects of services liberalization, 19 chapters on individual service sectors consider the issues which WTO Members need to consider when framing their negotiating positions and objectives for the new round and preparing their industries for a more open trading environment: the economic importance of the sector; the manner in which it is regulated and traded; problems of definition and classification; and the pattern of commitments undertaken by Member governments under the GATS. Many of the papers also identify prevalent forms of trade restriction or discrimination and suggest areas for further work. In addition, the work includes a detailed description of the structure of services commitments as submitted by WTO Members with respect to the four modes of supply which constitute the definition of trade in services under the GATS. The contributions have been provided by experts of the Trade in Services Division of the WTO Secretariat, with responsibility for the services or subjects in question.