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PRESS RELEASE: PRESS/TPRB/235
17 September 2004

TRADE POLICY REVIEW: REPUBLIC OF KOREA

Further trade liberalization and structural reforms, the key to sustained growth

Korea’s economy has achieved an impressive recovery from the Asian crisis, with its GDP per capita having been restored to pre-crisis levels, according to a report on the trade policies and practices of the Republic of Korea released on September 17 by the WTO Secretariat.

This economic recovery has undoubtedly been fostered by wide-ranging structural reforms and the maintenance of outward-oriented trade and investment policies as far as manufacturing and services are concerned. The recovery was also facilitated by a favourable external economic environment, the report says.

Nonetheless, the WTO Secretariat report notes that Korea faces several related economic challenges. These include sluggish domestic demand, resulting in possible over-reliance on exports as the main source of current growth, and the need for further trade liberalization and structural reforms to develop a more competitive economy.

The WTO report, along with a policy statement by the Government, will be the basis for the Trade Policy Review (TPR) by the Trade Policy Review Body of the WTO.

The following documents are available in MS Word format.

• Secretariat report
  > Contents and summary observations (12 pages, 112KB)
  > Economic environment (13 pages, 347KB)
  > Trade policy regime: framework and objectives (24 pages, 279KB)
  > Trade policies and practices by measure (44 pages, 392KB)
  > Trade policies by sector (35 pages, 445KB)
  > Appendix tables (41 pages, 1788KB)
    
• Government report (22 pages, 203KB)
    
• Chairperson's concluding remarks
    
• Minutes of the meeting are available approximately 6 weeks after the meeting.
    

Note  back to top

Trade Policy Reviews are an exercise, mandated in the WTO agreements, in which member countries’ trade and related policies are examined and evaluated at regular intervals. Significant developments that may have an impact on the global trading system are also monitored. For each review, two documents are prepared: a policy statement by the government of the member under review, and a detailed report written independently by the WTO Secretariat. These two documents are then discussed by the WTO’s full membership in the Trade Policy Review Body (TPRB). These documents and the proceedings of the TPRB’s meetings are published shortly afterwards.

Print copies of previous TPR publications are available for sale from the WTO Secretariat, Centre William Rappard, 154 rue de Lausanne, 1211 Genève 21 and through the on-line bookshop.

The TPR publications are also available from our co-publisher Bernan Press, 4611-F Assembly Drive, Lanham, MD 20706-4391, United States.

Schedule of forthcoming reviews  back to top

Rwanda: 28 and 30 September 2004
Norway: 11 and 13 October 2004
European Union: 25 and 27 October 2004