Issues covered by the WTO’s committees and agreements

Revised Agreement on Government Procurement

The revised Agreement on Government Procurement (GPA) expands the coverage of the original GPA and makes a number of improvements to the provisions of the Agreement. Two-thirds of the parties to the GPA were required to accept the Protocol of Amendment before the revised GPA could enter into force. This condition was met on 7 March 2014 and the revised GPA entered into force on 6 April 2014 for the first ten parties to have accepted the Protocol.


Expanded coverage

The revised GPA expands the market access opportunities under the Agreement by adding numerous government entities (ministries and agencies) to the scope of the GPA and by including new services and other areas of public procurement activities in its expanded coverage.
The parties to the revised Agreement will see gains in market access of an estimated US$ 80 billion to 100 billion annually, bringing the total coverage of the Agreement to US$ 1.7 trillion annually.

 

Improvements to GPA provisions

The revised GPA text is generally based on the same principles as the original Agreement, i.e. non-discrimination, transparency and procedural fairness, and contains the same main elements as the text of GPA 1994. Nonetheless, the revised text improves on the GPA 1994 in  a number of ways.

  1. The revised text entails a complete revision of the wording of the various provisions of the Agreement to streamline them and make the text easier to understand.
  2. The revised text has taken into account developments in current government procurement practice, notably the use of electronic tools. It sets out related requirements to ensure that the general principles of the GPA are fully respected in the electronic era. It also incorporates additional flexibility for parties' procurement authorities — for example, shorter notice periods when electronic tools are used.
  3. The special and differential treatment provisions (S&D) that are available to developing members acceding  to the GPA have been clarified and improved. This is expected to facilitate their accession, thus expanding the membership of the Agreement and market access opportunities.
  4. The revised text introduces a specific new requirement for participating governments and their relevant procuring entities to avoid conflicts of interest and prevent corrupt practices. This signals a belief on the part of the parties that the GPA can play a part in promoting good governance. The revised Agreement is also seen as an important tool for promoting a transparent and relatively corruption-free environment in the economies that are in the process of acceding to the Agreement.

 

Entry into force

The revised GPA entered into force on 6 April 2014 for the ten parties that had accepted the revised Agreement by 7 March 2014. For each party that accepts the revised Agreement after 7 March 2014, the revised GPA enters into force on the 30th day following the date of acceptance.

A party to the revised GPA is only required to provide access to the procurement opportunities covered by the revised GPA to the other parties that have accepted the revised Agreement.