How is the WTO expected to bring benefits to member-countries?

The WTO benefits simply by being a rule-based multilateral trading system. The alternatives are:

• No international trade at all
• Bilateral systems that would be based, as they used to be before the WTO was formed, on economic, military and political power.

In the WTO all members have both rights and obligations to be fulfilled. Even the poorest or smallest WTO members can question the trade polices of the larger members. Furthermore, they can increase their bargaining power by forming alliances with countries that share their interests.

Member countries have a wide range of rights that are enforceable under the WTO’s dispute settlement procedures. By being a member, smaller or poorer countries can protect their trading interests and have some say in the way the trading rules are made.

The main benefits that members get are:

• Security of access: The WTO negotiations ensure that almost all the tariffs of developed countries and most those of developing countries have been ‘bound’ against increases. Such binding means that market access will not suddenly be disrupted by changes in duties or other restrictions by importing countries.
• Stability of Access: At their borders all countries are required to apply a uniform set of rules about duties, product standards and import licences, all of which have already decided by pertinent parts of the Agreements.

Secure and stable access to markets enables Stability of Investment conditions that allow manufacturers and exporters to make investment and production plans without uncertainty.

Since the WTO agreements aim at establishing a trading system with as few barriers as possible, it results in a wider choice for a country's consumers and businesses.

WTO agreements also ensure that landlocked countries have easy access to and from the sea.

Furthermore, a WTO member has the right to some form of compensation if its trading interests are hurt by another country. This right is guaranteed by the WTO dispute settlement mechanism. Developing countries have the same rights as other countries. The WTO Secretariat can make a qualified legal expert available to developing countries.

What are some of the important benefits that have already been received by member-countries?

For 25 years since the GATT agreement started in 1948 global economic growth averaged about 5% per year, a high rate that was partly the result of lower trade barriers. World trade grew even faster, averaging about 8% during the same period.

The benefits of the WTO are those that come from the trade liberalization achieved by lowering of tariff and non-tariff barriers in developed and in developing countries. It has given countries including developing countries greater access to international markets.

For example, developing countries’ goods exports in 1999 grew by 8.5%, twice as fast as the global average.

In 2000, the value of merchandise exports from various developing regions and the transition economies expanded faster than the global average of 12.5%.

The 2000 figures were 20.8% for Latin America , 26.2% for the transition economies, 27% for Africa , 51.4% for the Middle East and 18.4% for Asia . Most of these exports went to developed countries, where for many products, the tariffs dropped to zero.

Tariffs on industrial products now average less than 5% in industrial countries.