Bridges Weekly Trade News Digest • Volume 5 • Number 35 • 16th October 2001
GATS: Financial Services Last But Not Least In Services Week
WTO Members concluded the 2-12 October services cluster, or Services Week, with several meetings on financial services. During the third and final day of the Council for Trade in Services’ (CTS) negotiating sessions (see BRIDGES Weekly, 2 October 2001), delegates discussed aspects of negotiating proposals on financial services.Also, the Committee on Trade in Financial Services (CTFS), one of the subsidiary bodies to the CTS, convened on 11 October to review the status of acceptance of the Fifth Protocol to the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) containing Members’ modified schedules of commitments in the financial sector. Furthermore, the CTFS on 10 October organised an informal seminar where Members and intergovernmental organisations with observer status at the WTO, such as the World Bank and IMF, were briefed by three international standard-setting organisations.
Special Session on Financial Services
Discussions on negotiating proposals regarding financial services and, to a lesser extent, recreational services, were among the last items on the October Services Week’s agenda. Members focused in particular on a US negotiating proposal on financial services (S/CSS/W/27), the scope of which many developing countries found too broad, though they nevertheless agreed that the sector should be on the negotiating table. Specifically, criticism was directed towards a US call for far-reaching transparency in national legislation relating to trade in financial services. In the view of several Members, this requirement would be premature because of the ongoing work within the Working Party on Domestic Regulation on the elaboration of disciplines pertaining to domestic legislation (GATS Art. VI:4).
According to trade sources, discussions on the financial services sector "were not really substantive"; this despite the fact that financial services are among the ‘top-ten’ sectors where both the EC and the US are seeking far-reaching further liberalisation.
Other meetings during Services Week
During an informal half-day seminar, and as a contribution to the CTFS’ mandate to identify issues for future discussions, Members and organisations with observer status were briefed by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, the International Organization of Securities Commissions, and the International Association of Insurance Supervisors on financial standard-setting worldwide. Inter alia, presentations and discussions addressed the question of whether the particular situation of developing countries was reflected in the objectives, implementation and reported problems of international standards.
On 11 October, the CTFS addressed only one of the issues on its agenda: the status of acceptance by Members of the Fifth Protocol to the GATS Embodying the Results of the Financial Services Negotiations. The Protocol, which contains Members’ modified commitments in financial services resulting from negotiations held in late 1997, has still to be accepted by seven Members, including Bolivia, Brazil, the Dominican Republic and Poland. During the meeting, the Dominican Republic informed the Committee that all necessary steps had been finalised on the national level to enable its acceptance of the Protocol; as a result, the Committee will demand the CTS to temporarily reopen the Protocol for ratification.
The next services week will take place in December 2001.
"Briefing note on NGO/EC Liaison meeting, 25th September, Brussels," CUTS, 26 September 2001; ICTSD Internal Files.