About WTO:
By: Khalid Yousufzai
WTO was born out of negotiations;
Everything the WTO does is the result of
negotiations
The WTO is ‘member –driven’, with decisions taken by
consensus among all member governments
The WTO is an intergovernmental organization aimed
at reducing tariff and non-tariff barriers to
international trade in goods, facilitating trade in
services, protecting intellectual property rights,
harmonizing trade rules, and strengthening the rule
of law. The WTO, the successor of the GATT, was
established on January 1, 1995. Currently, the WTO
consists of 151 member nations of which 110 are
either developing or least-developed countries. In
addition, 29 countries are in the process of
acceding to the WTO.
The WTO began life on 1 January 1995, but its system
is half a century older. Since 1948, the general
agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) had provided
the rules for the system.
It did not take long for the General Agreement to
give birth to an unofficial, de facto international
organization, also known informally as GATT. Over
the years GATT evolved through several rounds of
negotiations.
The largest GATT round, was the Uruguay Round which
lasted from 1986 to 1994 and led to the WTO’s
creation. Whereas GATT had mainly dealt with trade
in goods, the WTO and its agreements now cover trade
in services, and in traded inventions, creations and
designs (intellectual property).
The WTO is run by its member governments. All major
decisions are made by the memberships as a whole,
either by ministers who meet at least once every two
years (the ministerial conference can take the
decisions on all matters under any of the
multilateral trade agreements) or by their
ambassadors or delegates (who meet regularly in
Geneva). Decisions are normally taken by consensus
as the WTO belongs to its members. The countries
make their decisions through various councils and
committees, whose membership consists of all WTO
members.
Afghanistan submitted its request for accession to
WTO on April 10th, 2003 under the Article XII of the
Marrakesh Agreement establishing the WTO. The WTO
General Council examined Afghanistan’s request
before summer 2003 and granted Afghanistan the WTO
Observer Status on December 2004.
Now, Afghanistan is committed to accede the WTO as
soon as technically feasible. Ministry of Commerce
and Industry (MoCI) is currently the concerned
ministry in Afghanistan with respect to WTO
accession. MoCI with close cooperation and
coordinator of the sectorail ministries drafted the
Memorandum of Foreign Trade Regime (MoFTR) and it is
still underway to be finalized and get approved by
the government of Afghanistan.
In addition to leading to full integration of
Afghanistan into the world economy and the
multilateral trading system, WTO membership will
send a signal to the investment community that
Afghanistan has an attractive trade and investment
environment based on the rule of law and best
international practices. The rule of law will in
addition promote good governance. This will
certainly build investors’ confidence in
Afghanistan.
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