Talk:World Trade Organization/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about World Trade Organization. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Viet Nam or Vietnam

in Membership: Since when is "Viet Nam" two words? How about "Vietnam" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.101.79.184 (talk • contribs) 00:54, 31 December 2004

Isn't "Viet Nam" what the people that live there call it? matturn 05:28, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Its official name in international organizations is two words: Viet Nam. User:Modi 06:40, 26 May 2005 (CET)

EU

The article doesn't mention that the European Union represents the countries of the EU in the WTO, and there seems to be a discrepancy in the Template:WTO because it lists some members of the EU (such as Belgium, Germany) but not others like the UK, yet they're all represented by the EU and therefore probably shouldn't be listed. -- Joolz 11:00, 8 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I also think there is a problem with the member list. For one, an article "WTO" should not be in a category "WTO members". The WTO is not a member of the WTO. And, as pointed out above, the member list is not accurate. I also don't like the fact that the list points to "Economy of" articles instead of the articles on the members itself.

I therefore would like to remove the category "WTO members" from this page if no one objects.

Karl-Friedrich Lenz 00:23, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

I've fixed the cat:WTO members thing, and someone else seems to have fixed the template as I don't see any EC member states there now. I think it's fine to link to Economy of. Rd232 15:32, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

IP Law

Some people in Kenya complain WTO forcing India to adopt anti generic drug regulation. [1] 142.51.21.5 19:40, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC) India had been the largest source of cancer and other medicines for many poor countries. All that's gone now because of pressure from US pharmaceutcal companies.Fkh82 23:27, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Needs Information on Pranksters

The Yes Men are extremely important when discussing critism of the WTO. Does anyone have anything to say about them?

They are hilarious? I think there is a wikipedia page on them, a link could be added —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.189.133.20 (talk) 04:34, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

The Yes Men page is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yes_men#WTO I've just watched the Yes Men film: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0379593 It ran for nearly an hour and a half, and showed video from several international conferences where they impersonated the WTO! 58.174.242.29 (talk) 16:47, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Saudi Arabia

please note that Saudi Arabia now is a member of WTO.

SPECIAL THANKS FOR ALL MEMBERS IN THE WIKI FOR THERE WORK......

Great! One minor clarification: it is not yet a member, but soon. According to the WTO website entry for Saudi Arabia:

WTO General Council formally concluded on 11 November 2005 negotiations with Saudi Arabia on the terms of the country’s membership to the WTO. Saudi Arabia will become a full member 30 days after acceptance by their government.

Which is (correct me if I'm wrong) 11 December 2005? And this assumes that the SA government has accepted the WTO's terms for their admission. Right? If so, I'll update the map etc. then. In any event, welcome! :) E Pluribus Anthony 04:11, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

According to my information, SA will become a member on... checks Yeah, 11 December.

ナイトスタリオン ✉ 09:29, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Merci! :) E Pluribus Anthony 09:37, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Gladly! (Ah, feel the wikilove. ;))

ナイトスタリオン ✉ 10:18, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Critique

Far from recommending deletion, the critique section needs to be greatly strengthened. One of the fundamental problems with the GATT(S) is that it includes clauses preventing anyone saying anything that might damage the future profitability of a private company. This draconian "law" has been used for everything from suing the Canadian government for making perfectly accurate but financially damaging comments about the serious environmental impact of the production processes employed by a particular company (and its products themselves) to preventing whistleblowers revealing information of vital importantce to the public about failures to repair the infrastructure of rail networks. For the Wikipedia to extend such censorship to deleting the entire section on criticisms of the WTO would run seriously counter to the public interest. Quester67 07:56, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This section should be deleted. An encyclopedia has no room for a partisan belief. If it's absolutely necessary, it should be titled "controversy" and should contain information about the various groups resisting the WTO. It should not just be a list of the author's views regarding the WTO and world trade.

A critique (or controversy) section is valid if verifiable criticisms/issues from reputable sources can be cited. Yes: it should not summarise a particular author's views. E Pluribus Anthony 20:30, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

I support a renaming to 'Controversy'. The section needs to be rewritten though, so that it avoids stating interpretations and opnions as fact.

I deleted the critique section. The arguments were without merit and very slanted. Besides, there are plenty of places on the internet to read anti-WTO viewpoints. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.156.222.184 (talk • contribs) 22:20, 12 April 2006

Seqsea, I deleted the "criticism" section for good reason. It is full of biased and unfounded statements. Unless somebody wishes to write a more professional critique, it should remain deleted. Such a poorly written and slanted "criticism" would never be found in a traditional encyclopedia, and Wikipedia is better off without it. It sounds like it was written by a freshman college student taking an anti-globalization class. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 4.157.17.148 (talk • contribs) 23:03, 13 April 2006

The criticism section needs to be completely overhauled.

The large majority of it is unsourced and should be deleted unless fixed. WP:SOURCE
The last contention employs Weasel Words. It should be changed from "many non-governmental organizations" to something grounded in the sources.
In addition, the arguments for and against a consultative parliamentary assembly don't seem to belong in a criticisms section. If kept, it should be moved to an article elsewhere.

I'll take action unless consensus overrules. --Iliaskarim 04:36, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Maltese membership

A Maltese reader has written to the Help Desk saying that the member box at the bottom doesn't contain Malta. He wanted to add it but was unable to. I wanted to add it but am unable to. Could someone please add Malta to the list of member countries at the bottom of the Malta article. Capitalistroadster 02:59, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

Someone corrected this appearently. Alinor 20:36, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

Map

The map needs to be updated, Saudi Arabia has officially become a member -- Eagle^a^mⁿ 08:32, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

Has already been updated.

ナイトスタリオン ✉ 10:39, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Guyana? This may be a bit presumptious of me, but I was just looking at the map and saw that French Guyana is not coloured as a member of the EU, despite the territory's own article stating that it is indeed considered a member. Considering the relatively noticable size of the place on the map (I mean to say that we don't necessarily need to get ALL of the French overseas territories...), shouldn't we consider amending this? I realize that it is considered an "outermost territory" and all, but considering how every other article on the subject of the EU appears to count French Guyana as a valid part, I fail to see how this disqualifies it for striped colouring. I don't really know for sure though. What do you guys have to say? —Preceding unsigned comment added by The jt (talk • contribs) 00:19, 11 June 2007

9/11 links?

Why are there no links between this and 9/11? Or indeed between this and the World Trade Center? I find that to be quite confusing. I was just writing up a bit about s11, the anti-globalisation and anti-WTO group who were a prime suspect for the World Trade Center bombings of 2001, and was going to check back links, but there is absolutely nowhere to put this. Are we trying to avoid controversy here? Avoid controversy at the expense of accuracy? I think that there should be some linkage in there somewhere. Zordrac (talk) Wishy Washy Darwikinian Eventualist 01:52, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

There is no relationship at all between the WTO, an intergovernmental organisation in Geneva, and the WTC, a (former) building in New York, despite the similarity of the names. Sandstein 21:06, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

The rebels in Seattle, I asume you are talking about, targeted businesses, we "reds" have no interest in blowing up civilians. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.189.133.20 (talk • contribs) 14:23, 23 December 2007

Map: two styles

E Pluribus Anthony, I see that you have reverted to "your style" of the map [Image:WTOmap currentstatus.png] again. It has some noticable differences with the "other style" [Image:WTOmap.png].

Negative:

smaller (mostly island) states are totaly unnoticable. In contrast "other style" has circle-represantation of smaller states, becouse zoom level does not allow for them to be seen if scaled according to real size.
"other style" represents states with application, but no approval yet, better. In contrast the description in the WTO article below the "your style" image is wrong - gray-colored Syria HAS official interaction with the WTO, even if it is not observer - it has OFFICAILY lodged applications multiple times.

Other:

"your style" has less levels of distiction than "other style" - so it puts different states in the same category. (for example there is no distiction between negotiating observers and non-negotiating observers)
I have already implemented the "no borders inside the EU" principle that was previously added to the "your style".

Positive:

dual-coloring of EU member states - to show that they are collectively represented as "European Communities", but are also individual members. This is even better than the "no borders" way.

So, I suggest to take the better things from the two styles. If you agree I can make a version of "other style" with EU-internal borders. Then you can make it double-striped? Alinor 10:19, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes: noticeable and positive differences:

actually, your (other) style of map/projection is not in common use in Wp (it's also inaccurate; see below). It's not merely my style of map: it is one based on a commonly-used map image (also listed here).

The dual colouring/bordering of the EU states is more representative and accurate (as they are members singly and collectively); previously, it was – and still is – wrong.

As for Syria, we can easily revise the categories on the map (actually, the caption), but there's no reason to single it out based on its applications: while it has official interaction, it is a non-member and is not an observer (Syria isn't even mentioned on the WTO website.) Actually, since the WTO does not categorise countries this extensively, we should possibly limit (i.e., members, observers, and not) or eliminate them all on the map – i.e., including only members and not, saving any distinctions for text (as is now the case). Any additional categorisations on the map may lead a user down a garden path. Also, see the map's talk page.

As for microstates, we can depict them similarly on either. As well, your map is incomplete: much of the Pacific is cut-off on your map, omitting the eastern portion of Siberia and providing inaccurate locations for numerous island groups in Oceania – circles mean nothing if they aren't placed properly.

Since "my" style of map is more commonly used and consistent with others on Wp, we can possibly retrofit your notions onto it, not the other way around. Until then ... E Pluribus Anthony 19:30, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

Be nice to each other, I don't want to see two of my favourite country-and-organization-article-editors quarrelling. ;) I agree with Alinor that we should use circling for the smaller island nations, since it makes them more easily visible; and we should probably revise the categories a bit. While I'm commenting here: Recently a government official of the Bahamas stated that they wouldn't join the WTO in the immediate future, just FYI. —Nightstallion (?) 13:18, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

I completely agree: users should obviate unnecessary debates in the first place by not insinuating adversarial "your-and-other"/"us-and-them" notions with maps and exercising better tact. :)

Regardless, at least the current map has undergone additional rigour/discussion and the other map is still incomplete. I'm all for compromise: microstates can be accommodated for on either with circles et al. As for categories, the WTO doesn't distinguish as we have (as per their website), so we should probably limit this on a map (to three categories: members, observers, and non-members) and describe distinctions in-text. To that end, I will update the Bahamas as an observer. E Pluribus Anthony 22:10, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

I am not emphassing the "your/other" classification. The point is not in the authorship, but in the contents ofcourse. Also:

I have nothing against the "common style" - only against the invisibility of small states - it is inappropriate to show organisation members/non-members in world scale.
I have already appreciated the dual coloring/bordering of the EU. No need to repeat this to me.
Syria. See this document "WTO membership in brief" from the WTO site.
The document above (and the different lists of observers at the WTO site) show multiple levels of interaction: member, applicant without approval yet (Syria, formerly Iran), observer not negotiating(Eq.Guinea, Vatican), observer negotiating. Also when you click on each observer you can see the most recent negotiation activity. Also there is a table showing these most recent activities. So we can not state that these levels of participation are irrelevant. It is obvious that not all "negotiating observers" are the same - the "frozen" Bahamas, etc. are clearly different from "active" Ukraine, Vietnam, etc. and it would be good if we depict that distinction.
As far as I can see on the current map ("without circles") - Liechtenstein (1 pixel) is depicted as non-member, but it realy is.

Also, OK, let's retrofit some notions into the commonly used map style:

out-of-scale circles for the invisible states: Andorra, San Marino, Vatican City, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Malta, Bahamas, Jamaica, the other Caribbean states, Cape Verde, Sao Tome and Principe, Comoros, Seychells, Mauritius, Maldives, Bahrain, Hong Kong, Macao, Singapoure, Timor-Leste, all Oceania states without Papua, Australia, New Zealand; some other circle if I have omitted it. And maybe put a note in the corner "circles only for easier visualisation. Not actual size and form".
Hong Kong and Macao - how are they represented: individualy, by China (then maybe no circles, but they are still "WTO members", so...) or dualy (then color the circles with stripes and reword the legend to something like "dual representation").
Use a bigger version of the map. When it is thumbnailed this will pose no problem, and when its opened it would be better visible.

I would experience some difficulties with the geographicaly exact correct location of the circles, so can you do it? Alinor 19:02, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your response and clarification. Of course, for future reference: when you place phrases in quotation marks, you are "emphasising" those terms. Moreover, phrasing such as "your map" and "other map" (not "my map") – implying some sort of concordance with the latter – can be perceived as being adversarial. You could've obviated any offense by referring to the maps neutrally without quotation marks, by number, or by their projections: Robinson projection and Gall projection (?) If none was intended, none is received. Water under the bridge! Moving forward ...

thank you as well for the feedback. I agree about the microstates: on a predecessor of the current map image template, some were completely omitted (including Hong Kong, which is typically separated out by the UN), which I corrected. I will update the current WTO map with circles (having black outlines) for microstates and make various updates as above; however, HK, Macau, and China are each separate members and should be displayed as such. Some of them (e.g., circle for Timor-Leste) might be unnecessary, but I'll play with it. Don't worry.

Moreover, thanks for the helpful membership link! Given that, I think we should have five categories on the map:

Members (150) (Tonga is newest member) - dark green (all); dark/light green (EU)
Observers: ongoing accessions (30) - bright yellow *
Observers (2) - medium yellow
Non-member: negotiations pending (1) - greyish/dark yellow
Non-member - grey

Anything else would unnecessarily complicate the map. To that end (*), I don't think we need to parse this category by year – I didn't say it was irrelevant: I think it's unnecessary to depict these on the map (as previously). Perhaps a table would be better for these countries (w/years) or a link to the above instead?

As well, the current map/template is small enough to load quickly, yet large enough to represent most territories clearly and discretely. And increasing its size will only increase the pixelation unnecessarily (blech!). Essentially, it cannot be made larger without creating an entirely new map; this is something which I can't do just now but can work on for later. Thanks! E Pluribus Anthony 09:28, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I have also a table in mind. Maybe next week I will upload it (in Membership section). Now about the categories, that I propose:

"Member" - 149, all - dark green; EU-striped
"No official interaction" (or similar text) - 15+2 - gray or black
"Negotiating observer, active in the last 3 years" (details in table) - 28 - yellow
"Non-negotiating observer, to start later" - 1 (Eq.Guinea) - light orange
"Frozen procedures or inactive for at least 3 years" (all types of reasons - details in text/table - special exception, self-suspended, veto) - 5 (Syria, Seychells, Bahamas, Vantuatu, Vatican) - red

This is slightly different from the regular categories, but I think describes the situation better (eg. Bahamas/Vantuatu are not lumped together with states actively seeking membership). Alinor 16:41, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Good. About the categories you propose: TMI (def 2) for a map. I'm going to default to the Word file and categories in "WTO MEMBERSHIP - IN BRIEF" provided above and the categories I outlined from that

Equatorial Guinea and Vatican are mere observers
though inactive, the Bahamas and Vanuatu are listed as seeking accession.

This keeps things simple and consistent for any visitor wanting to compare. Let's put the years and other anomalies in a table, shall we? E Pluribus Anthony 17:03, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Tada! I've updated the maps with circles for microstates and with the categories indicated above (as per the WTO Word listing). Instead of the microstate/circle listing above, I consulted the Wp list of countries by area and decided to encircle only those microstates with areas less than 2 500 km². Moreover, I did not encircle territories/island states that are not sovereign except those for which WTO information is pertinent (e.g., Macau)

I might also add the base map to the templates. Anyhow, let me know if you've any questions. Thanks again for the input. E Pluribus Anthony 05:18, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Good job. But I still have some reservations/suggestions:

About the visibility (I think that in the particular case practical visibility is more important than "hard rules" like <2500sq.km)

yellow islands on white background are too unnoticable (yellow circles are good, becouse they have "boundary")
some island states (and Qatar) without circles are not recognisable as separate from near "big land masses" (Solomon Islands, ...)

So for these problems I suggest two solutions:

eighter represent with circles Bahamas, Trinidad-Tobago, Cape Verde, Vanuatu, Fiji, Solomon Islands, Qatar and Timor-Leste (when it is gray against green Indonesia - no problem, but if both are green - not recognisable as separate).
or draw a circle (or other more appropriate line) around the same states without filling it (they "give enough material" themselfs - if there is a circle for separation and represantation).

About the categories. As far as I understand the reasoning behind the current categorisation is that "the WTO lists them this way". But this is clearly not enough. Seychells have NOT NEGOTIATED since 1998 and they are in the colored the same as Ukraine. I suggest to use information from these pages of the WTO site (individual country pages - link for Seychells above) for dividing observers into different categories (but without increasing the categories count - so the new map will not be more complex than the current). I think that the 3 year period is a good enough point in time for classification a negotiation "forzen". Also the new categories would better reflect realities - not lumping Eq.Guinea (due to start negotiations 2007 at the latest as per the "no more than 5 years after becoming observer" rule of the WTO - see Members&Observers note at their site) with Syria. Also it would be better to use more differentating colors, not just gradiations between green and yellow (better for visibility).

"No official interaction" (or similar text) - 15+2 - gray or black
"Negotiating observer, active in the last 3 years" (details to be added in a table) - 28 - yellow
"Non-negotiating observer, to start later" - 1 (Eq.Guinea) - light orange
"Frozen procedures or inactive for at least 3 years" (all types of reasons - details are already in the text/to be added to the table also - special exception, self-suspended, veto) - 5 (Syria, Seychells, Bahamas, Vantuatu, Vatican) - red

Is there a problem with these categories? Alinor 17:37, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback: I'll change the yellows which are more meant to imply that they are more similar to each other (as observers, in whatever respect) than with either members or non-members.

Additionally, I've provided rationale for microstates: I do not believe that circles around states that are clearly distinguished already is warranted. Why not Lebanon, for instance?

Lebanon is both visible and distinguishable enough without circles. Also when most of the "similar" (eg. islands/small states) countries in the region are represented with circle it would help to make similar represantation for the rest, that "do not deserve circle" because of only begin a little bigger - eg. line around/circle for: Bahamas, Cape Verde, Solomon Islands, etc. as listed above. IMHO. Alinor 17:29, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I made some lines around Bahamas, etc. and embedded circles in them. Any problems with this version? I think that we should make similar lines around the real places of Kiribati, Palau, etc. and move their current circles "in the line". Alinor 14:30, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Ditto for additional categories: there are numerous ways to skin the cat, and the proposed categories do not add any value that can be more effectively accommodated for through in-text descriptions/provisos, a table, and or relevant links. As you can see, the WTO lists Seychelles, (et al.) as an observer state in the midst of "ongoing accessions" (regardless of date); so clearly that should be enough. However, I will retitle that category appropriately. E Pluribus Anthony 19:30, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

No, the proposed categories add value - they represent the PRACTICAL situation. You can find many sources about the freezing/abandoning of the Bahamas/Seychells/Vanuatu WTO negotiations. The last activities of them can be seen on the WTO pages for these countries' accessions (many years in the past). Vatican negotiations are not expected (as writen on the WTO site). Syria is most probably "blocked" 3 times for 4 years. All this is VERY different than the actively negotiating members (some activity at least in the 2003 - again as per WTO site country accession pages). Alinor 17:29, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, I disagree: treat anomalies in-text, add a link, and or a table. E Pluribus Anthony 23:30, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Syria pending

Because of USA veto like in the case of Iran, or something else? Alinor 16:41, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Non-member: negotiations pending (dark yellow) E Pluribus Anthony 17:10, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, yes. I ask about the reason for multiple delays (2001, 2004, 2005 - no approval by WTO to start talks)... Alinor 17:00, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the wheels of bureaucracy? As well, arguably, Syria and other countries may succumb to the ~~obstructionism~~opining of powerful WTO members. E Pluribus Anthony 01:51, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Bureaucracy, right. ;) —Nightstallion (?) 14:31, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Can we find some link with information on the subject? Alinor 17:10, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

See here for more info on accessions. To sum up, since the WTO operates on consensus, every Member can technically veto an accession, and the large trade blocs sometimes use this leverage to ~~extort~~ negotiate extensive concessions from new applicants, which takes a lot of time. Of course, in the case of Syria, other political considerations may also play a role. Sandstein 21:03, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

non-sovereign territories of member states - WTO status

We color the non-sovereign territories on the map the same as their "mainland". For example - New Caledonia, Guam, Puerto Rico. But are we sure that they are covered by the WTO agreement of their states? Maybe exactly the opposite is true - because of the special situation of these territories they are excluded and do not have to apply MFN rates, etc.? Alinor 14:48, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

That's a good question: I would assume that such extraterritories, as subnational entities (and likely without formal standing at the WTO), should be treated/coloured just as the countries are unless there's evidence otherwise – New Caledonia/French Guiana > France; Guam/Puerto Rico > USA; etc. Hong Kong and Macau are the glaring examples: each are WTO members separate of China. (And then there's the EU.) However, we can change it if contraindicators are forthcoming. E Pluribus Anthony 15:08, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

I'd say colour them the same for now. They have no customs autonomy as far as I know, and so they're covered by the agreements of their mother countries; read the membership criteria part of the WTO homepage. —Nightstallion (?) 21:03, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

New Caledonia should not be stripe-colored, because it is not inside the EC (like many other France and UK dependencies). See Special member state territories and their relations with the EU. Also it would be good to have a link about WTO relations of these territories (WTO treaties of "mother states"?) like Greenland, Puerto Rico, Tokelau, Niue, New Caledonia, Gibraltar, etc. Alinor 10:57, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

My apologies for that; I've reverted this. E Pluribus Anthony | talk | 12:58, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

TRPM ??

Second level: General Council

The daily work of the ministerial conference is handled by three groups The General Council, The Dispute Settlement Body and The Trade Policy Review Body.

1. The General Council- is the WTO’s highest-level decision-making body in Geneva, meeting regularly to carry out the functions of the WTO. It has representatives (usually ambassadors or equivalent) from all member governments and has the authority to act on behalf of the ministerial conference which only meets about every two years. The council acts on behalf on the Ministerial Council on all of the WTO affairs. The current chairman is Amina Chawahir Mohamed (Kenya).

2. The Dispute Settlement Body - Made up of all member governments, usually represented by ambassadors or equivalent. The current chairperson is Eirik Glenne (Norway).

3. The Trade Policy Review Body (TPRB) - the WTO General Council meets as the Trade Policy Review Body to undertake trade policy reviews of Members under the TRPM. The TPRB is thus open to all WTO Members. The current chairperson is Don Stephenson (Canada).

Can someone tell me what the TRPM is? Did I miss it somewhere else in the content of this page, or should it be stated here? Fizban 23:36, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

This probably means the trade policy review mechanism, or TPRM, which deals with the systematic examination of every member's policies every few years. Sandstein 20:49, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Number of agreements

I see that the number has been changed from 30 to 31. Can anyone verify this? (Just making sure it's not one of those, "let's see if anyone noticed if I change numbers" type of edits.) Oh no itsJamie^Talk 02:41, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

here it says "here are about 60 agreements and decisions totalling 550 pages". How many are these agreements in the end?--212.72.201.199 11:31, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

It's really a matter of how you count the agreements - do you include the GATT-era agreements, the plurilateral agreements, the ministerial decisions, the accession agreements, etc.? Depending on how you count, you get anywhere between 50 and some hundred agreements. From the context, I think what are meant are the (main) Uruguay Round agreements, but even so there is ambiguity in counting, as the treaty structure is incredibly byzantine. Somewhere around 30 should come closest, I think. Sandstein 20:58, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

References & External Links

Hi All, I'm planning to update and reorder the references and external links sections of the WTO page, as I feel they are out of date and unweildy for anyone actually wanting to access info. I'm going to 1) remove references which are not WTO-specific (for instance, works on "Global Business Regulation", or "free trade" should be featured in other articles. 2) Put all books, reports and articles under the "references" section 3) put all websites under the "external links" section, under a series of sub headings which sould make them easier to access If you have any comments on or problems with how I've done this, lets please have a discussion here. Cheers, User:MMc 20:17, 8 Feb 2006 (EST)

Forgot to mention: All books, reports and articles will be ordered chronologically, newest ones first...

User:MMc 20:29, 8 Feb 2006 (EST)

It looks like there are a huge amount of unreferenced statements/sections on this page - for instance the entire History of the WTO section and the Formal Structure section. Is there something I'm missing or is this article seriously in awful shape? --Iliaskarim 04:44, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Copyright status of WTO documents?

Knowledgeable editors are invited to contribute to this discussion on Wikipedia talk:Public domain. Sandstein 20:44, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Public domain doesnt clearly mention the WTO; the best clues are at Wikipedia:Public_domain#_note-compendium206_01.

On Wikinews, I have asked whether a specific WTO report(0.5MB / 90 page PDF) could be considered PD in order to be transcribed onto Wikisource. Opinions here or there would be appreciated. John Vandenberg (talk) 02:08, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Contradiction

The intro says that Sadui Arabia was the last state to join; the main body of the article says Tonga. --Robdurbar 14:11, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I think Tonga was the most recently admitted, but it hasn't ratified the agreement and so is not a member. Saudi Arabia, on the other hand, has both been admitted and ratified the agreement, so it is a member. Hence while Saudi Arabia is the newest member, Tonga was the state that most recently was admitted. Depending on how we define "join" here, either would be permissable. Yill577 20:04, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Accession

The article should mention this: How is accession to the WTO decided? Do the members coutries vote? Do individual countries have a veto? jaco♫plane 19:23, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Should this be a news article?

This organisation is changing and develping the whole time. In such situations the article will always be lagging behind the events of the real world. Therefore, as much as possible the article should list information, which doesn't change from day to day. For example what is the status of negotiations with a certain country? Unless there is an editor, who reviews the whole article every week such information will never be up to date.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Smallchanges (talk • contribs) 13:50, 9 October 2006

Russia

I think Russia has been accepted as a WTO member, so the graphic on the first page is no longer correct. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Pkmilitia (talk • contribs) 15:57, 29 January 2007

Not so. The negotiations are still continuing as of 27.02.07. See http://www.wto.ru/en/news.asp?msg_id=19316

61.68.135.28 02:44, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

The accession negotiations of Russia are problematic; but according to some it can become a member next year. Evren Güldoğan (talk) 02:53, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

As of 16 12 11 Russia has become a member, somebody needs to update this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.71.220.7 (talk) 23:13, 16 December 2011 (UTC)

Ukraine?

According to this BBC news article, Ukraine has joined the WTO. Should the maps be changed yet? (I don't really know whether the accession is completely official yet) 81.98.34.193 (talk) 20:22, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the source is correct. The Ukraine has successfully joined the WTO, and the maps must be updated. (209.7.171.66 (talk) 20:58, 7 March 2008 (UTC))

Ukraine officially became a member on the 16th of May, 2008. Cape Verde is becoming a member in July. Evren Güldoğan (talk) 02:53, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

Removal of "No Footnotes" tag

I have removed the {{nofootnotes}} tag from the References section as it is inappropriate - the article contains a huge number of in-text citations. The comment with the tag was "Need to use footnotes to indicate what claims the following references support". If the issue is that there is a huge list of references other than the footnotes above, then an appropriate tag might be a "cleanup" tag or similar that linked to this talk page suggesting a review of the references to either:

make in-text citations from the reference to the relevant area, as suggested, or
cut down the list to only general references - ie. works that give a good overview of the WTO.

However it looks like alot of the references are actually the full reference given for a short footnote above. So another suggestion would be to combine the full reference into the footnote, and remove it from the reference section... If I get some time I might have a go at that, unless anyone else has any other suggestions? Cheers, JenLouise (talk) 01:54, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreements

I think that we need to improve the agreements section. A general chart of the WTO Agreement and its annexes providing links to separate articles on individual agreements would be cool (It would also help to shorten this article a little.). If someone can make such a chart I'm willing to provide the articles within two months. Evren Güldoğan (talk) 02:50, 3 July 2008 (UTC)

POV FORK

Could I get some commentary on the encyclopedic value of Criticism of the World Trade Organization.

Relevant policy WP:POVFORK.

~~I am nominating it for deletion as irredeemable. Input is appreciated.~~

Going to await input before making any sudden moves.--ZayZayEM (talk) 12:44, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I created this article per WP:SS, when I rewrote some parts of the WTO. Therefore, I don't see why this article could be regarded as POVFORK.--Yannismarou (talk) 15:25, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

WTO navigation template

Hi all. I've been thinking that it might be useful to create a navigation template for the WTO, something like the UN has. We have 46 pages in the category. What do you think? I made a very rough draft at ~~User:PatrickFlaherty/wto~~ Template:WTO nav. I welcome any input or suggestions. Thanks --Patrick (talk) 17:02, 31 July 2008 (UTC)

I moved the template to Template:WTO nav. --Patrick (talk) 01:16, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Policy Laundering Paragraph

The Following Paragraph was removed by PatrickFlaherty:

The lack of transparency is often seen as a problem for democracy. Politicians can negotiate for regulations that would not be possible accepted in a democratic process in their own nations. "Some countries push for certain regulatory standards in international bodies and then bring those regulations home under the requirement of harmonization and the guise of multilateralism."^[1] This is often refered to as Policy Laundering.

While the Parapragh describes a problem that is not an exclusive Problem of the WTO-Process but occurs with all international treaties, it is one of its major Problems. Can we add it again? Mond (talk) 07:15, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. There is no proof that the WTO is suffering from this problem. --Patrick (talk) 07:19, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Too general as a statement. Can you focus it on WTO and properly source it (with regards to WTO again).--Yannismarou (talk) 07:29, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

As a matter of fact, the whole paragraph is too vague IMO and should go.--Yannismarou (talk) 07:32, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, "successful" Policy Laundering is one that does not get much public attention. This is the sole purpose of the laundering in the first place. Still there should be countless ecamples to find. Hosains Paper describe Policy Laundering as a general "feature" of the negotiations of international treaties. The WTO is one place where a lot of the more important treaties are negotitates. Thus the WTO is a place for potential policy laundering. Does Policy Laundering there actually happen? Here is one about TRIPS [2]. An other one concerning TRIPS: In the process of implementing a "Software Patents" Directive in Europe the EU-commission claimed that Software Patents where a reqiurement in TRIPS where it was their own interrest to establish this directive they could make it look like it was an external requirement. Another thing: Just Look at all the Protests against the WTO meetings and the protest against the treaties proposed there (GATS etc..etc.) These Protests show that what is dealt out in the WTO process is often not very popular among people. Thus it should be obvious the the WTO is often use to implement unpopular politics. Yet the lack of transparancy of the process makes it hard to pinpoint who is responsible for some regulation or an other. Sure a lot is not directly done in the offical WTO negotiation but in "backroom-deals" that surround the negotiations. Mond (talk) 10:27, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

You are running up against original research. I will read the link and get back to you, but I don't think we can add it unless we have specific examples from reliable third party sources. --Patrick (talk) 21:26, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

I would not say that counting 1 and 1 together already constitutes "original research". Here is a post that has 2 examples for policy laundering (but the access to the original papers behind them seems to be restricted to subscribers..) Also note: that while the term "policy laundering" is rarther new (2004) and thus not used in older papers, authors of older papers describe policy laundering in different words... Mond (talk) 11:42, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Ok: Yet another source that the WTO TRIPS as an example of policy laundering. Is it ok to add the paragraph again? Mond (talk) 14:32, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I checked the book mentioned but it doesn't mention policy laundering at all. I just feel that that the source should say something like TRIPS is a form of policy laundering. Interesting book though. --Patrick (talk) 20:25, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

The Blogpost sums it under the title "policy laundering". Even if the Book does not mention the term (it is a rather new term). The method ist just to important to ignore it. Besides the harm done in poorer countries this is the point that describes how the people in the rich countries have disadvangates from this intransparent process as well. This is an important concept and imporant to anyone who wants to get an overview what the WTO is all about. Thus imporant for an encylopedic article that would be otherwise lost in (esay to prove) technical details. Mond (talk) 20:48, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

I wrote on the Economics wikiproject to see if we can get another opinion. --Patrick (talk) 21:29, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Ok. But it is not really a queation of economics at all. It is a question of politcis or sociology even. How international treaties are used to implement certain policies without domestic democratic control. etc.. Mond (talk) 07:31, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

In my opinion, you would need a reliable source linking policy laundering to the WTO in order to include such a paragraph. Not to mention that paragraph was full of weasel words and needed a lot of clean up. Until you can cite a source saying that policy laundering happens at the WTO, the concept doesn't belong in this article.

And a minor point: why is policy laundering capitalized everywhere? Is it a proper noun or something? Seems to me it should be lower case, but I could be wrong. -FrankTobia (talk) 04:57, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

The question is not if policy laundering happens or not: The critical point is if the WTO process CAN be used for policy laundering. There are quit a lot of sources that say that international treaties and institutions are often used for PL. The WTO is one of the most important places where international treaties are negotiated. As everyone knows most of the negotiation is done in green room talks and thus without any transparancy. We can conclude: the WTO negotations are a prefect place if there is a need for a policy to be launderd. I quoted quite a few sources that indicate that this happend with some WTO treaties like TRIPS. Btw: which weasel word did you find? Mond (talk) 07:48, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Yet another case: Bush wants to use the WTO to prohibit labels on products about their energy efficiency. This is in the name of "competition". ... is known as "policy laundering" I would say Richard Stallman is quite a trusted source as are Friends of the Earth. Mond (talk) 11:04, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Plus: The Political Economy of Data Protection, Peter K. Yu, Drake University Law School, lists TRIPS in the policy laundering section. Mond (talk) 17:35, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

Another: "Telecommunications and Empire", Jill Hills, Power relations within the global telecommunications empire" Mond (talk) 17:52, 23 August 2008 (UTC)

The section in question was overly general and gave undue weight to policy laundering in this article about the WTO. Find a source where someone reputable says "The WTO enables policy laundering, for example..." and I'm sure we can work together on the language. The problem with your argument is that your conclusion that "the WTO negotiations are a perfect place" for policy laundering is clear original research and does not belong on Wikipedia as such. -FrankTobia (talk) 02:40, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I also think this would require better sourcing. CRGreathouse (t | c) 03:36, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

I have to agree with Frank and CRGreathouse. The sources you have provided don't really do the trick. I'm sure there will be sources in the future that say what we are looking for. --Patrick (talk) 07:03, 24 August 2008 (UTC)

Improvements in the article

Any ideas for improvements? I tried to shorten the article since it was a bit overwhelming and I just want to make sure that I didn't shorten it that much. --Patrick (talk) 23:29, 19 August 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for asking. Well Patrick, I think the history section could be vastly improved. Currently, it doesn't give any history except for GATT and the Doha Round. Maybe incorporate the ministerial conferences section into it? --Patrick (talk) 06:27, 22 August 2008 (UTC)

Map, again

The maps appear to be out of date. It states here that Jordan's negotiation procedures are frozen or have not existed for three years, yet the Jordan page claims it is a member. Both maps seem to have the same issue. Cheerio... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.72.110.11 (talk) 14:52, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

Map needs to be updated.. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.191.175.217 (talk) 17:52, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Map of founding members need to be changed

Poland is one of founding members, as it was part of all previous agreements and rounds.You can check it on WTO website http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_E/tpr_e/tp136_e.htm So can somebody please update the map?

Iran Trade Law forums

In less than a day, I have twice reverted IP edits seeking to link a promotional site to the WTO article. The external site is Iran Trade Law which explicitly describes itself as a partisan site, viz 'A Gateway to Iran-Centered International Trade Debates'. My objections are in line with the guidelines WP:ELNO and WP:EL#ADV, noting that the site offers no helpful information on the subject of the WTO, and that the IP editors gave their link the misleading title 'International Trade Debates'. The guidelines suggest taking such a potentially controversial issue to the Talk page before pursuing administrative intervention. My guess is that there is more to come from the pro-Iran lobbyist(s). If we accept this, we would logically also need to link the article to similar advocacy from 30 other non-member countries which have observer status at the WTO. Cheers Bjenks (talk) 05:35, 14 April 2010 (UTC)

Contradicting maps

File:WTO negotiations (May 2010).png and File:World Trade Organization negotiations.svg need to be harmonized. I don't know off hand which is correct, if one is. Calbaer (talk) 06:40, 27 June 2010 (UTC)