Information Technology Agreement

Information Technology Agreement
Effective 1 July 1997
Depositary World Trade Organisation
Information Technology Agreement parties[1]

The Information Technology Agreement (ITA) is a plurilateral agreement enforced by the World Trade Organization (WTO) and concluded in the Ministerial Declaration on Trade in Information Technology Products in 1996, and entered into force 1 July 1997. Since 1997 a formal Committee under the WTO watches over the following of the Declaration and its Implementations.[2] The agreement was expanded in 2015.[3]

The aim of the treaty is to lower all taxes and tariffs on information technology products by signatories to zero.[2]

According to a 2017 study in the World Trade Review, the 2015 ITA expansion is "the most successful attempt at trade liberalization under the auspices of the WTO since its inception in 1995."[3] The study credits the success of the negotiations to four factors: "a narrower scope without a single undertaking approach, a negotiating group that contained many but not all WTO members, a focus on tariffs rather than non-tariff barriers, and avoiding a nationalistic opposition."[3]

References

  1. ↑ INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY: SCHEDULES OF CONCESSIONS
  2. 1 2 "Information Technology Agreement — introduction". World Trade Organization. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
  3. 1 2 3 Winslett, Gary (2017). "Critical Mass Agreements: The Proven Template for Trade Liberalization in the WTO". World Trade Review: 1–22. doi:10.1017/S1474745617000295. ISSN 1474-7456.
  • Information Technology Agreement, WTO .
  • ITA Schedules of Concessions, WTO .
  • "Ministerial Declaration on Trade in Information Technology Products" (PDF) (text of the declaration). Singapore: World Trade Organization. 13 December 1996. Retrieved 4 August 2010.
  • "Council for Trade in Goods – Implementation of the Ministerial Declaration on Trade in Information Technology Products" (WPF.ZIP or WPF.EXE). World Trade G/L/160 doc#97-1356; G/L/160/Add.1 doc#97-1935; G/L/160/Add.2 doc#97-3676 (text of the implementation with two "Note[s] by the Secretariat"). World Trade Organization. 2 April 1997; 5 May 1997; 17 September 1997. Retrieved 4 August 2010. Check date values in: |date= (help)
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