WTO New Round Legal Research

Author: Zhang Yuqing
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-08-01
Features: Theoretically speaking, after the establishment of the WTO, there should not be negotiation rounds like the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), as the WTO is a formal international organization and a formal negotiation venue, capable of holding negotiations at any time. Article 3, Paragraph 2 of the "Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization" states: "The WTO shall provide a forum for negotiations among its members on multilateral trade relations with respect to matters covered by the agreements contained in the Annexes to this Agreement. The WTO may also, according to decisions taken by the Ministerial Conference, provide a forum for further negotiations among its members on their multilateral trade relations and provide a system for the implementation of the results of such negotiations." In fact, since the conclusion of the Uruguay Round, the WTO has successively reached the "Agreement on Information Technology" and the "Agreement on Financial Services." For this reason, the WTO Ministerial Conference held in Qatar in November 2001 named this round of WTO negotiations the "Doha Agenda." The Doha Agenda covers a broad range of topics. We have written each chapter based on the issues of the Doha Agenda or as separate agreements. For each chapter, we strive to provide readers with a comprehensive understanding of each issue or agreement by introducing the relevant background, content, positions of the negotiating parties, and China's proposals, one by one. The last three chapters are not the main themes of the Doha Agenda negotiations, but they are both fundamental principles of the WTO and important commitments made by the Chinese government when it joined the WTO. Therefore, they are introduced separately to facilitate the development of domestic legal systems and the fulfillment of commitments.