MiIestone reached with the 500th amendment to WTO goods schedules
The update of Argentina’s WTO Goods Schedule, which was formally initiated on 26 July, marks the 500th notification under special procedures to modify these important legal instruments that form an integral part of the WTO legal texts. By ensuring security, transparency and predictability for trade in goods, the schedules of commitments constitute the backbone of the multilateral trading system.
The amendment of Argentina’s Goods Schedule was necessary to reflect changes resulting from the 2002 version of the Harmonized System, an international nomenclature developed by the World Customs Organization and used by WTO members to classify goods for customs purposes.
Although reference is normally made to “the” schedule of concessions of a WTO member, there are often different legal instruments that comprise it, as each amendment to the schedule must be officially recorded in order to take effect. These changes are usually called “rectifications” and “modifications” and can result from a number of different procedures, ranging from the formal correction of errors to the renegotiation of a tariff commitment. Recently, members have modified their goods schedules to record new tariff commitments under the expanded Information Technology Agreement and to eliminate farm export subsidies in line with the 2015 Nairobi Ministerial Decision.
In order to amend a goods schedule, a member must follow specific procedures which were agreed back in 1980. Through them, all WTO members have an opportunity to review the proposed change and make comments if necessary. To date, more than 97% of the procedures amending goods schedules have been successfully concluded.
To know more about WTO goods schedules and their changes see:
- What is a WTO schedule?
- Modifications of schedules to reflect ITA expansion commitments
- Modification of schedules to eliminate farm export subsidies under the Nairobi Decision
Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140