WTO 정보기술협정(ITA) 현황과 쟁점

Amid the stalemate of the DDA negotiations, the ITA-style plurilateral negotiations for sectoral liberalization attract public attention as a realistic alternative approach in the WTO. In particular, after the successful completion of the ITA expansion product list in July, the multilateral effort for trade liberalization is regaining its support and interest from business communities. Aiming to introduce historical background and basic concept about the ITA, this article tries to overview the origin and evolvement of sectoral negotiations, the negotiating history of the ITA deal and the subsequent implementation issues, the final result of the ITA expansion product list, and the relevant WTO jurisprudence in the EC-IT products case. First, the ITA is a plurilateral agreement by some WTO members to eliminate tariffs on 203 IT product items, and the current expansion deal is to liberalize additional 201 IT product items. While this deal has been agreed by certain number of WTO members, it would facilitate multilateral trade liberalization since the result of negotiations will be implemented by the revision of MFN tariff bindings in members' WTO schedules of concession. Considering that this approach will be continued for the time being at the WTO, we need to catch up such change of negotiating environment and make serious efforts to reflect our interests effectively into the negotiations. Second, several outstanding issues are to be further developed, including the relationship between ITA and WTO, product classification and scope of attachment B items and the NTB work program. While the participants continue to discuss these matters at the ITA committee, the outcome of the discussion has not been satisfactory so far. In particular, attention and systemic approach for the appropriate product classification of attachment B items would be needed. The panel findings of the EC-IT product case suggest a useful benchmark for clarifying the meaning and scope of product descriptions in attachment B.