ϲʹ legal texts
Most of the ϲʹ agreements are the result of the 1986–94 Uruguay Round negotiations, signed at the Marrakesh ministerial meeting in April 1994. There are about 60 agreements and decisions totalling 550 pages.
Negotiations since then have produced additional legal texts such as the Information Technology Agreement, services and accession protocols. New negotiations were launched at the Doha Ministerial Conference in November 2001.
The texts reproduced here do not have the legal standing of the original documents which are entrusted and kept at the ϲʹ Secretariat in Geneva.
Special and differential provisions in the legal texts:
Developing countries, particularly least-developed countries, are given more flexibility in implementing certain ϲʹ rules.
ϲʹ Agreements series
The Uruguay Round agreements
The “Final Act” signed in Marrakesh in 1994 is like a cover note. Everything else is attached to this. Foremost is the Agreement Establishing the ϲʹ (or the ϲʹ Agreement), which serves as an umbrella agreement. Annexed are the agreements on goods, services and intellectual property, dispute settlement, trade policy review mechanism and the plurilateral agreements. The schedules of commitments also form part of the Uruguay Round agreements.
- Marrakesh Declaration of 15 April 1994
- Final Act
- Agreement Establishing the World Trade Organization
Annex 1
Annex 1A Multilateral Agreements on Trade in Goods
- GATT 1994
- Must be read with GATT 1947, (see below) > Explanations
- Other duties and charges (GATT Art.II:l(b)), Understanding
- State trading enterprises (GATT Art.XVII), Understanding
- Balance-of-payments, Understanding
- Regional trade agreements (GATT Art.XXIV)
- Waivers of Obligations, Understanding
- Concession withdrawal (GATT Art.XXVIII), Understanding
- Marrakesh Protocol to the GATT 1994
- Agriculture
- Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures
- Textiles and Clothing Note: this Agreement was terminated on 1 January 2005. See Textiles
- Technical Barriers to Trade
- Trade-Related Investment Measures (TRIMs)
- Anti-dumping (Article VI of GATT 1994)
- Customs valuation (Article VII of GATT 1994)
- Preshipment Inspection
- Rules of Origin
- Import Licensing
- Subsidies and Countervailing Measures
- Safeguards
- Trade facilitation
Annex 1B General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)
Annex 1C Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) (unamended version)
TRIPS Agreement (as amended on 23 January 2017)
Annex 2
Annex 3
Annex 4 Plurilateral Trade Agreements
- Annex 4(a) Agreement on Trade in Civil Aircraft
- Annex 4(b) Agreement on Government Procurement (as amended on 30 March 2012)
Note: this Agreement was amended on 30 March 2012. The previous version of the Agreement (GPA 1994) is available here. - Annex 4(c) International Dairy Agreement
Note: this Agreement was terminated end 1997. See document - Annex 4(d) International Bovine Meat Agreement
Note: this Agreement was terminated end 1997. See document
Uruguay Round ministerial decisions and declarations
Decisions adopted by the Trade Negotiations Committee on 15 December 1993 and 14 April 1994
- Measures in favour of least-developed countries
- Notification procedures
- Agriculture: measures concerning the possible negative effects of the reform programme on least-developed and net food-importing developing countries
- Textiles and clothing: notification of first integration under Article 2.6
- Technical barriers to trade:
- Customs valuation (GATT Article VII):
- Services:
- Government procurement: accession to the agreement
- Dispute settlement: application and review of the Dispute Settlement Understanding
- Agreement Establishing the ϲʹ: acceptance of and accession to the agreement
- Trade and environment
- Organization and financial consequences flowing from implementation of the Agreement Establishing the ϲʹ
- Establishment of the Preparatory Committee for the ϲʹ
Declarations adopted by the Trade Negotiations Committee on 15 December 1993
- Contribution of the ϲʹ to achieving greater coherence in global economic policymaking
- Relationship of the ϲʹ with the International Monetary Fund
Decisions adopted by the Trade Negotiations Committee on 15 December 1993 and 14 April 1994
GATT 1947
The original agreement dealing with trade in goods, now incorporated into GATT 1994 (see above) Explanations
Post-1994 GATS protocols
These are additional agreements negotiated after the Uruguay Round and attached to the General Agreement on Trade in Services. There is no "First Protocol". The related schedules of commitments can be ordered from the .
Post-1994 accession protocols
These are the negotiated terms of membership for countries joining the ϲʹ after it was created on 1 January 1995. They include each new member's schedules of commitments.
Members' schedules of commitments
These schedules contain the commitments made by individual ϲʹ members allowing specific foreign products or service-providers access to their markets. The schedules are integral parts of the agreements. In the print version these schedules comprise about 30,000 pages for all ϲʹ Members.
For goods in general: binding commitments on tariffs. For agriculture: tariffs, combinations of tariffs and quotas, export subsidies and some types of domestic support.
- Goods schedules gateway: gives links to individual member governments’ goods schedules agreed during the Uruguay Round.
- Post-1994 Information Technology Agreement schedules
- Protocols of accession, for countries that have negotiated and become ϲʹ members after 1995.
- Paper versions: available from the (Volumes 3-32 of the Legal Instruments embodying the Results of the Uruguay Round. You can select the countries which interest you from the titles and order online.)
- Help on reading a goods schedule (coming soon)
Binding commitments on how much access foreign service providers are allowed for specific sectors. Includes lists types of services where individual countries say they are not applying the "most-favoured-nation" principle of non-discrimination.
- . Find consolidated schedules of commitments and MFN exemptions by country, sector, and mode of supply. Data covers the period January 1995 to December 1999. Does not include data on current negotiations or on countries which joined the ϲʹ since January 2000.
- Protocols of accession for countries joining the ϲʹ after 1995
- Help on how to read a services schedule
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