Latvia as a full Member of the WTO [12.02.1999]
- Formal conclusion of Latvia's accession process
As the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has previously reported, last year in October the WTO General Council adopted the decision on the admission of Latvia to the WTO, whereby the accession process and both bilateral and multilateral accession negotiations that were launched 5 years ago were then practically concluded. On December 17 Saeima approved both the protocol of Latvia's accession to the WTO and the protocol of Latvia's accession to the Marrakech Declaration establishing the WTO, and hence on January 11 Permanent Mission of the Republic of Latvia to the United Nations, in Geneva submitted to the Secretariat of World Trade Organization the official accession instrument. In accordance with the agreement provisions Latvia became a full Member of the WTO on February 10.
- The benefits of Latvia being a Member of the WTO
As already have been widely discussed in public, the membership to the WTO means international recognition of Latvia as an equal, credible and stable trading partner, which implements a constant and liberal trade policy. Membership also imposes a set of obligations, while similarly provides for certain rights and possibility to promote its interests both through the regulation of bilateral economic relations as well as the participation in the process of the liberalization of multilateral trade policies.
- Latvia's participation in the process of multilateral trade liberalization
Supposed agenda on the new round of negotiations contains several outstanding items - like the liberalization of trade in agricultural products, trade in services, including the liberalization of trade in audiovisual services, as well as the protection of trade related intellectual property rights. Already now active discussions have been initiated, WTO Members are formulating national positions and adopting the negotiation mandates, while undeniably the consultations among Members are similarly taking place in order to form the country blocks having corresponding positions. This is the process in which the government of Latvia will take an active part, and as a pre-step already taken to ensure the coordinated internal procedure is the regulation drafted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and recently adopted by the Cabinet of Ministers "On Procedure of the Implementation of the Membership of Latvia to the World Trade Organization" of 09/02/1999.
- Regulation by the Cabinet of Ministers "On Procedure of the Implementation of the Membership of Latvia to the World Trade Organization"
To put in a summary this is the basic document that provides for the basic principles and establishes the necessary mechanism according to which the implementation of Latvia's commitments to the WTO is internally coordinated and overseen, as well as the mechanism to initiate the issues that are of interest to Latvia by preparing the mandate for negotiations with both the WTO Members and the WTO acceding countries, including CIS countries, China.
With this a Consultative Board of Latvia's membership to the WTO is established and comprised of representatives of line ministries. By the unanimous approval of all Board members, representatives of the private sector – entrepreneurs and NGOs, can participate as observers having advisory rights. To provide administrative and technical assistance for the Board, under the Ministry of Economy a Secretariat is established, which coordinates the technical cooperation of line ministries concerning the WTO related issues as well as compiles requests and inquiries submitted by the WTO Members and oversees the preparation of replies.
Main functions of the Board is to review proposals concerning the implementation of Latvia's membership to the WTO and to approve national position (mandate) concerning the issues related to the WTO and formulated by the responsible ministries, as well as to give its assessment of the compatibility of draft legal acts and international treaties with the Latvia's commitments in the WTO if necessary.
At the WTO meetings the national position, approved in the framework of the Board is communicated by the permanent representative to the WTO (since January 21 Maija Manika, the counselor of the Permanent Representation of the Republic of Latvia to the United Nations and other international organizations is appointed as the permanent representative to the WTO) or by the official authorized by the Board.
- Planned activities of public information on possibilities to exploit the membership of Latvia to the WTO
As the Ministry of Foreign Affairs have been informing before, in the nearest future there are planned several seminars in order to inform a wider part of public on the potentials arising from Latvia's membership to the WTO. Accordingly the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in cooperation with the Ministry of Economy on March 17 is planning to hold an informative seminar and will invite to participate all interested parties – entrepreneurs and other representatives of the private sector, as well as the government officials. Seminar is planned to cover the following main issues:
- the new round of multilateral trade negotiations in the framework of the WTO and the representation of national interests, including the drafting and adoption of Latvia's position within the framework of the Consultative Board and the cooperation of state and private sectors;
- trade defense measures applicable within the framework of the WTO, both in cases of fair and unfair competition(safeguards and anti-dumping and anti-subsidy measures);
- exploiting the possibilities offered by the WTO integrated data base (IDB) and national enquiry points (available at the Ministry of Economy), which means availability of the information on trade turnover of the WTO Members, import tariffs, technical and phyto-sanitary requirements, licensing conditions etc.
The second seminar, which is planned to be organized by the WTO Secretariat in cooperation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is intended to the Baltic region (both Estonia and Lithuania are also to become Members of the WTO), will be held in Riga, in May. In this seminar entrepreneurs will be informed popularly about commitments within the WTO as well as the opportunities provided for the effective interaction of the private sector in the development of international trade.
Conclusion
Today – February 10, 1999 – in Latvia's international economic relations a new phase is commenced – we become a Member of the most significant economic organization in the world. Undeniably, this creates obligations as well as certain limitations, including a mechanism under which Latvia can protect domestic producers suffering from excessive import. Today the necessity to protect domestic producers is in the center of attention of producers themselves, politicians as well as government officials. However, it can not be ignored that being a Member of the WTO is a way having two directions and parallel to the protection of the domestic market we must concentrate on exploiting foreign markets. The latter is offered by the WTO: both by participating in the round of multilateral negotiations and bilateral negotiations with the WTO acceding countries that are of most significance to Latvia's trade, and defending the national interests in the WTO Dispute Settlement mechanism; as well as by ensuring the market access on non-discriminatory conditions in the foreign markets not yet explored by Latvian producers. The beneficial use of the latter opportunity is in the hands of entrepreneurship itself, whereas the national government will work to ensure a safe traffic on this two way trade relationship highway.
