Preparing Requests and Offers

7.3 Technical Aspects of Requests

Requests may be addressed to a group of participants or to an individual Member. There are possibly four relevant targets, which are not mutually exclusive

1. Addition of sectors that are not included in the relevant schedule.
    
2. Removal of existing limitations or reductions in their restrictiveness (e.g. increases in the number of admitted suppliers or the levels of foreign equity participation). A request may also seek to transform an “unbound” into a commitment with or without limitations. Such requests always relate to measures affecting market access (Article XVI) or national treatment (Article XVII).
    
3. Inscription of additional commitments (Article XVIII) relating to matters not falling within the scope of Articles Articles XVI and XVII. A case in point is the Reference Paper on regulatory principles in basic telecommunications; a relatively high number of such requests were made, and implemented, during the extended negotiations  under the Fourth Protocol.
    
4. Removal of MFN exemptions. Paragraph 6 of the Annex on MFN Exemptions provides that existing exemptions be subject to negotiations in successive rounds of negotiations.
    

A request may be presented in the format of a simple letter. Thus, if a participant seeks a full commitment under Articles XVI or XVII, it would simply request “none” be inscribed in its trading partner(s) schedule.

Additional commitments under Article XVIII may need to be technically more specific. The Article merely provides a framework for scheduling commitments on matters not falling under market access or national treatment. As evidenced by the telecommunications Reference Paper, such commitments may extend to areas not even addressed within the GATS itself, such as the establishment of an independent regulator. If a request is made to undertake such obligations not defined in the GATS, these must be described in accurate legal terms.

The process of exchanging requests tends to be purely bilateral in nature, without involving the WTO Secretariat. There was a suggestion at one stage in the Uruguay Round that when a request is made, a copy should also be sent to the Secretariat for its records. However, that practice was followed only for a short period of time.