Analytical Note, November 2004
Analysis of Actual Liberalisation Versus Quad Members GATS Commitments and Offers: Focus on a) Mode 1 and b) Tourism and Travel Related Services.
This note is focused on two areas: a) mode 1 or cross-border supply of trade in services, and b) the tourism and travel related services sector. The goal of this exercise is to assess whether GATS commitments made by a few of the most developed service economies, i.e. Quad members, can be considered “weak”, below actual levels of liberalisation and occurring outside of the WTO GATS regime.
This note may prove to be timely in light of the recent calls by developed countries for initial offers as soon as possible and revised offers by May 2005, as it shows that GATS commitments and initial offers of the Quad members in key areas of interest to developing countries and least developed countries (LDCs) continue to remain cautious and bound below actual levels of liberalisation.
This article was tagged: GATS, Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Market Access, Services, World Trade Organization (WTO)
