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PRESENTATION OF WTO TOPIC: URUGUAY ROUND

The seeds of the Uruguay Round were sown in November 1982 at a ministerial meeting of GATT members in Geneva. The work program that the ministers agreed formed the basis for what was to become the Uruguay Round negotiating agenda. It took four more years of exploring, clarifying issues and consensus building, before ministers agreed to launch the new round. Finally Uruguay Round is the name by which the eighth round of the multilateral trade negotiations held under the auspices of the GATT is popularly known, because it was launched in Punta del Este in Uruguay, a developing country, in sep 1986.

Because of the complexities of the issues involved and the conflicts of interests among the participating countries, the Uruguay Round could not be concluded in Dec 1990 as was originally scheduled. It took seven and a half years, almost twice the original schedule. It covered almost all trade. It was quite simply the largest trade negotiation ever, and most probably the largest negotiation of any kind in international trade history.

When the negotiation dragged on, Arther Dunkel, the Director General of GATT, presented a Draft Act embodying what he thought was the result of the Uruguay Round. This came to be popularly known as the Dunkel Draft. This was replaced by an enlarged and modified final text which was approved by delegations from the member countries of the GATT on Dec 15, 1993. This final act was signed by ministers of 125 governments on April 15, 1994.

The UR sought to broaden the scope of Multilateral Trade Negotiations far wider by including new areas such as:

Trade in services Trade related aspects of intellectual property (TRIPs) Trade related investment measures (TRIMs)

ISSUES DISCUSSED / SUBJECT OF THE URUGUAY ROUND Reducing specific trade barriers and improving market access. Strengthening GATT disciplines. Problems of liberalization of trade in services, TRIPs, TRIMs. The traditional concerns of the GATT were limited to international trade in goods.

Result of the UR Agreements: WTO : Following the UR Agreement, GATT was converted from a provisional agreement into a formal international organization called WTO with effect from January 1, 1995. WTO now serves as a single institutional framework encompassing GATT and all the results of the Uruguay Round. It is directed by a Ministerial Conference that will meet at least once every two years and its regular business is overseen by a General Council. The WTO Secretariat is based in Geneva, Switzerland.

Objectives of WTO: The main objectives of the WTO is to help trade flow smoothly, freely, fairly and predictably. Principles of WTO: To help trade flow as freely as possible. To achieve further liberalization gradually through negotiation. To set up an impartial means of settling disputes.

FEATURES OF UR AGREEMENT: Liberalization of trade in manufactures: It is sought to be achieved mostly by reduction of tariffs and phasing out of non tariff barriers. Liberalization of Agricultural Trade: The feature of UR is the inclusion of agriculture in the MTN. the main principles in the agreement on agriculture is to establish fair and market oriented agricultural trading system and to more operationally effective GATT rules and disciplines are: market access, domestic support, export subsidies.

GATS: The general agreement on Trade in Services, which extends multilateral rules and disciplines to services, is regarded as a landmark achievement of the UR. It covers four modes of international delivery of services: 1. Cross- border supply(transfer data flows, transportation services) 2. Commercial presence(provision of services abroad through FDI or representative offices) 3. Consumption abroad(tourism) 4. Movement of personnel(entry and temporary stay of foreign consultants)

TRIMs: Trade Related Investment Measures refer to certain conditions or restrictions imposed by a government in respect of foreign investment in the country. The agreement on TRIMs provides that no contracting party shall apply any TRIM which is inconsistent with the WTO Articles.

TRIPs: The protection of intellectual property rights has become an issue of wide and serious discussion with the formation of the General Agreement on Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights under the UR Agreement. Intellectual property rights are the rights given to persons over the creation of their minds. They usually give the creator an exclusive right over the use of his/her creation for a certain period of time like Copyright, Trademarks, Patents etc.

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