Prospects for Services Trade Negotiations

Asian Development Bank Economics Working Paper Series #319

Asian Development Bank Economics Working Paper No. 319

33 Pages Posted: 12 Nov 2012

See all articles by Jeffrey J. Schott

Jeffrey J. Schott

Peterson Institute for International Economics

Minsoo Lee

Asian Development Bank

Julia Muir

Peterson Institute for International Economics

Multiple version iconThere are 2 versions of this paper

Date Written: November 1, 2012

Abstract

Trade and investment in services are difficult to measure, and the regulatory barriers that inhibit the free flow of services are hard to quantify. As a result, very little attention has been paid to dismantling barriers to services trade and investment. Rather, free trade negotiations tend to focus on liberalizing merchandise trade. This paper examines what has been achieved in both regional and multilateral compacts by surveying international precedents involving Asian countries in which services reforms have been included in bilateral and regional trade pacts. We then assess the prospects for services trade negotiations and explore how services trade negotiations could be pursued over the next decade through two distinct channels: the Trans-Pacific Partnership and a plurilateral approach among groups of World Trade Organization countries. We find that in the case of developing Asia, free trade agreements have largely excluded services or have only committed to “lock in” current practices in a narrow subset of service sectors. This is also the case in agreements negotiated between developing countries, which have produced less substantial commitments to liberalize services than those negotiated between developing and developed countries. Multilateral negotiations on services have also underperformed, as substantive negotiations on services in the Doha Round never really got underway. To that end, we advocate a stronger effort by developing Asian countries to prioritize services negotiations in their regional arrangements, and to expand coverage of services in those pacts to a broad range of infrastructure services that are included in other free trade agreements in force or under construction in Asia and the Pacific region.

Keywords: International trade, services, regional trade agreements, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, General Agreement on Trade in Services, Doha Round, Trans-Pacific Partnership, Asia-Pacific

JEL Classification: F10, F13, F14, F15, F23, F59, G28, H50, H70

Suggested Citation

Schott, Jeffrey J. and Lee, Minsoo and Muir, Julia, Prospects for Services Trade Negotiations (November 1, 2012). Asian Development Bank Economics Working Paper Series #319, Asian Development Bank Economics Working Paper No. 319, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2174129 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2174129

Jeffrey J. Schott (Contact Author)

Peterson Institute for International Economics ( email )

1750 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
United States

Minsoo Lee

Asian Development Bank ( email )

6 ADB Avenue
Mandaluyong City
Metro Manila, 1550
Philippines
63-2-683-1622 (Phone)
63-2-636-2342 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://www.adb.org

Julia Muir

Peterson Institute for International Economics ( email )

1750 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
United States

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