ACCESSIONS:
Legislative Action Plan (LAP) Register
Governments wishing to accede to the WTO need to begin assessing, as early as possible, to what extent their domestic trade‑related legislation and practices conform with WTO rules. Acceding governments are invited to present copies of relevant legislation at the same time as the Memorandum on the Foreign Trade Regime (MFTR). Laws and regulations should be provided in one of the three official WTO languages. As this is a time-consuming process, it needs to begin as early as possible.
Having identified the gaps in domestic legislation, acceding governments can begin elaborating a comprehensive Legislative Action Plan (LAP). This document contains a full inventory of enacted WTO-related legislation and provides the roadmap for WTO-related domestic legislative work. The trend has been for LAPs to be submitted early on in the accession process. While the presentation of a LAP before the first meeting of the Working Party is not a prerequisite, it is very useful to do so as it sets the direction for future work.
WTO members may invite acceding governments to present legislation for review in draft form. This ensures that acceding governments avoid asking their parliaments to pass and later amend legislation that is inconsistent with WTO rules. It has now become common practice for draft legislation to be presented for comments by members to ensure that it is compliant with WTO rules prior to its adoption.
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