Tourism and Other Services: The Issues in Multilateral Negotiation

• Author: Edwin Laurent
• Pages: 76-84

76 Understanding International Trade

TOURISM AND OTHER SERVICES:

The Issues in Multilateral

Negotiation

77

77

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With the combined effects of the erosion of preferences for traditional

agricultural exports and the region’s relatively high wage structure making

it difficult to compete in agriculture and labour-intensive manufacturing, the

services sector is widely seen as the hope for the future of the Caribbean.

After all, world trade in services has been growing at an average of 9% since

2000, reaching a value of US$2.1 trillion in 2004. Conventional wisdom

might suggest that increased focus should therefore be placed on services in

trade negotiations.

One of the prerequisites for success in multilateral negotiations is clarity

and precision of interests and goals. However, since the multilateral services

negotiations have already begun and are being conducted along set principles,

the CARICOM Members have to draw up their positions to fit into the already

existing framework. Hence, their strategy must be fully informed by and

coherent with the broader negotiating processes. This section reviews the

issues and considers the options for CARICOM.

The fundamental aim of the WTO’s General Agreement on Services

(GATS) is the liberalisation of trade in services. In other words, the removal

of governmental restrictions on trade and the promotion of international

competition, the fuller extension to services of the most favoured nation

(MFN) principle and ultimately subjection to the other principles of non-

discrimination, transparency and national treatment. The negotiations have

been about the removal of restrictions both through changes to the Agreement

in which negotiators have been seeking to reflect more fully core WTO

principles in the framework for services regulation and on a “request and

offer” basis. Here, participants volunteer to reduce, remove or phase out the