WTO | Services - gateway page

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Services trade

Ranging from architecture to voice-mail telecommunications and to space transport, services are the largest and most dynamic component of both developed and developing country economies. Important in their own right, they also serve as crucial inputs into the production of most goods. Their inclusion in the Uruguay Round of trade negotiations led to the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). Since January 2000, they have become the subject of multilateral trade negotiations.

See also:
> Services negotiations

SERVICES TOPICS
The GATS covers all services, with few exceptions.

> Services sectoral classification list

SECTORS:
Business and professional services

> Accountancy services

> Advertising services

> Architectural and engineering services

> Computer and related services

> Legal services

Communication services

> Audiovisual services

> Postal and courier, express mail services

> Telecommunications

Construction and related services

Distribution services

Educational services

Energy services

Environmental services

Financial services

Health and social services

Transport services

> Services auxiliary to all modes of transport

Movement of natural persons

News back to top

Introduction to services trade and the GATS back to top

Services — rules for growth and investment
A first explanation, in “Understanding the WTO”, the introduction to the WTO.

GATS: objectives, coverage and disciplines
A more in-depth look, in question-and-answer form.

Introduction to GATS
Download in PDF format (16 pages; 253KB; opens in a new window).
> Consult the Guide to downloading files.

Interactive course: General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)

The mandate back to top

Browse or download the text of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) from the legal texts gateway. The GATS is the first multilateral, legally binding set of rules covering international trade in services. See also related instruments.

Find decisions of WTO bodies concerning the GATS in the Analytical Index — Guide to WTO Law and Practice

Schedules of commitments and MFN exemptions

Introduction, with links to retrieve commitments and exemptions from Documents Online

Services Database
You can use this database to retrieve the services schedule for a Member, or to compare services commitments across Members. The database does not include data on current negotiations.

How to read a schedule

The protocols
Results of Post-Uruguay Round negotiations: on telecommunications, financial services, and movement of natural persons.

The Doha negotiating mandate
Section on services in the 2001 Doha Ministerial Declaration

Hong Kong Ministerial Declaration

Trade in services and LDCs
Articles IV and XIX of the GATS provide for “special treatment” for least-developed countries (LDCs). This has been pursued through, among other things, a waiver to allow preferential treatment for LDC exporters of services.

Work in the WTO back to top

The services negotiations A new services round began in early 2000. The mandate, negotiating proposals and developments in the negotiations.

The activities of the Services Council and its subsidiary bodies ... including the Committee on financial services, the Working Party on specific commitments, the Working Group on domestic regulation, and the Working Party on GATS rules.

Post-Uruguay Round negotiations (1994-97) After the 1986-94 Uruguay Round, negotiations on maritime transport, the movement of natural persons, financial services and telecommunications continued.

> Current Chairperson

Disputes back to top

List of disputes citing the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS)

Data on Services Trade back to top

> Dataset of services commitments in regional trade agreements
> Trade in merchandise and services
> International Trade and Market Access Data
> Services profiles
> Made in the World

Database

This integrated database — a joint initiative of the WTO and the World Bank — consists of information on members' commitments under the WTO's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), services commitments in regional trade agreements, applied measures, and services statistics.

> Go to I-TIP Services