Overview
This book is a comprehensive guide to the Millennium Round of multilateral trade negotiations which will be launched at the Third WTO Ministerial Meeting in Seattle in early December 1999. It deals in a readable way with the many difficult and controversial issues that will arise during the planned three-year negotiations. These include:- The new trade areas like the environment, labour standards, e-commerce and competition policy
- The issues that were new in the last Uruguay Round, such as trade in services and intellectual property rights, that are still far from resolved and
- Trade in agriculture, which is still badly in need of reform after a modest start in the last Round.
This book will provide all those interested in international business and domestic policy matters with the comprehensive overview they need to understand the dynamics of the WTO Millennium Round and the complex interaction of the trade and domestic policy issues.
The Millennium Round of multilateral trade negotiations, which will be launched at the Third WTO Ministerial Meeting in Seattle in early December 1999, is not just a private affair for governments. It will have far-reaching consequences for all of us as citizens, consumers, workers, and businesspeople. Yet trade negotiations have become so complicated that very few people fully understand them. Here we offer the ultimate guide to the many difficult and controversial issues that will arise during the planned three-year Millennium Round negotiations.
Critics of the multilateral trade process would have us believe that the WTO will force us to eat frankenstein food, pillage our environment and turn our factories into sweatshops. Undeniably, the Round will address many thorny issues that concern domestic regulatory policy and touch on sensitive matters of national sovereignty. New trade areas like the environment, labour standards, e-commerce and competition policy will strain the ingenuity and creativity of negotiators. In addition, there are the issues that were new in the last Uruguay Round, such as trade in services and intellectual property rights, that are still far from resolved. Finally, negotiators will have to come to grips with trade in agriculture, which with its large subsidies and high tariffs is still badly in need of reform after only a modest start in the last round.
WTO members will need to keep the momentum going and move forward with trade liberalization into the 21st Century. However, compromises will inevitably have to be made in many areas to reach an agreement that all WTO member countries can support in the end.