After three years of negotiations, 86 World Trade Organization (WTO) members announced substantial progress in e-commerce negotiations and will strive to reach agreement on most issues by the end of 2022.
On the 14th, WTO Director-General Okonjo Ivila welcomed this progress and said that it will bring important dividends to small and medium-sized enterprises, "the work currently being carried out is expected to bring greater stability and predictability to consumers and enterprises in the fast-growing digital economy."
Okoncho-Ivila also said the pandemic has highlighted the importance of e-commerce as an inclusive tool, helping small businesses, especially women-initiated businesses, to enter international markets. "I encourage the initiative to continue to open its doors to other WTO members and to continue to discuss the development needed to bridge the digital divide." She said.
There are currently 86 WTO members participating in the Joint Statement Initiative on E-commerce.
Wang Shouwen, vice minister of China's Ministry of Commerce and deputy representative of international trade negotiations, explained at the recent press conference of the State Council's new office that for some new issues, such as e-commerce, we believe that not all WTO members can accept this rule, and we are open to the use of joint statement initiatives, and some members first reach an agreement, that is, a plurilateral agreement to solve some specific rule issues in these areas. The conditions are ripe for the future to allow all WTO members to join.
Cui Fan, a professor at the School of International Business and Economics of the University of International Business and Economics and director of the Research Department of the China World Trade Organization Research Association, said in an interview with the first financial reporter that from the perspective of the history of the WTO negotiations, there are many cases of transformation into multilateral agreements on various sides of the issue when the conditions are ripe, and "considering that the benefits of the digital economy are so huge, we must find ways to find the least cost negotiation path to develop this rule."
Substantial progress has been made
As co-convenors, the trade ministers of Australia, Japan and Singapore issued a joint statement on the 14th, saying that the epidemic has highlighted the importance of the digital economy and strengthened the need for accelerated transformation of the digital economy and the need to manage global rules for digital trade.
The WTO E-Commerce Joint Declaration Initiative will update the WTO Rulebook in areas of vital importance to the global economy, the joint statement said.
The joint statement also revealed that on the basis of the existing WTO agreements and frameworks, the parties will continue to push the negotiations towards high standards and commercial significance, and the parties will continue to promote inclusiveness and encourage as many WTO members as possible to participate in the negotiations.
"On the substantive progress made so far in the negotiations," the joint statement said, "good results have been achieved in the negotiating teams for the eight articles, including online consumer protection, electronic signatures and verifications, unsolicited electronic information for commerce, open government data, electronic contracts, transparency, paperless transactions, and open Internet access." ”
The joint statement believes that the results already achieved in these areas will bring important dividends, including enhanced consumer confidence and support for enterprises to conduct online transactions.
Agreement was reached on most issues by the end of 2022
At the same time, there have been proposals to merge in other areas, including high-level discussions on electronic transmission of tariffs, cross-border data flows, data localization, source code, electronic transaction frameworks, cybersecurity and electronic invoicing, and market access.
The joint statement stressed that "negotiations in these areas will be intensified from early 2022".
The statement also noted that provisions that allow and facilitate data flows (flows) are key to high-standard and commercially meaningful outcomes, while the co-conveners of the initiative consider it essential that participants agree on a never-imposed electronic tariff.
The statement also said that in view of the tremendous progress made so far, the co-convenors will arrange and ensure that by the end of 2022, the parties agree on a plan on most issues, "throughout 2022, we will find opportunities for trade ministers to provide guidance on key issues in the negotiations".
Japan's Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Koichi Hagida said in a statement that he welcomed the substantial progress made in the negotiations over the past three years.
"As the world becomes more digitally connected, digital trade is making people around the world richer." "The WTO has a large number of members, so providing the WTO with digital trade rules that enable the Free Flow of Trusted Data (DFFT) will make business more predictable and stable," he said. This, in turn, will facilitate further digital trade. In order to achieve early results, we will strive to accelerate and further advance the negotiations. ”
Singapore's Minister of Trade and Industry, Tan Kim Yong, said: "Digital trade is becoming a key model for doing business today. The initiative will provide a stable regulatory environment for digital trade by strengthening rules and simplifying regulations. The initiative, which involves 86 members, will also help bridge the digital divide and encourage the adoption of digitalization, which will put our economy in a good position to take advantage of the benefits of new opportunities in the digital economy. ”
The experts interviewed by the first financial reporter are more optimistic about the form of the plurilateral agreement adopted by the WTO at present.
Huo Jianguo, vice president of the China World Trade Organization Research Association, told the first financial reporter that the current problem of the WTO is that the multilateral negotiations under the WTO have stagnated, and some of the uncontrollable members are always difficult at the last hurdle, dragging down the overall negotiation process, but the WTO is still an authoritative institution in today's international trading system, which has made great contributions to promoting the development of the world economy.
Cui Fan told the first financial reporter that looking back at the history of the WTO and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), in terms of anti-dumping and other agreements, they were formed by the various sides as the foundation and text, and then slowly conceived.
The Anti-Dumping Code, for example, was not attended by all GATT members at the time, and was supplemented and amended during the Tokyo Round of 1973-1979. Then, in the early 1990s, when the globalization landscape changed and the conditions were ripe, the relevant planimate codes became multilateral agreements, which took 16 years, cui fan explained.
Cui Fan said that in the current situation that the fundamental problems in the world have not been solved, if the requirements are too high, it will make the domestic contradictions of various countries easy to intensify. "In this case, the costs and benefits of the system will change over time. The most typical example is the digital economy, the cost of the digital economy to be negotiated is extremely high, but the benefits of the digital economy to be negotiated are also extremely high. He said.