WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  RESTRICTED 
G/MA/M/53 
7 June 2011 
 (11-2803) 
Committee on Market Access  
  
 
 
MINUTES OF THE MEETING HELD ON 12 MAY 2011 
 
Chairman: Mr. Daniel Owoko (Kenya) 
 
Subjects discussed Page 
 
1.  Periodic report of the Committee to the Council for Trade in  Goods 
(G/MA/SPEC/47) ................................................................................................................ ...... 2 
2.  Introduction of HS96 changes to schedules of concessions ................................................... 2  
(i)  Submission of HS96 documentation ............................................................................................ 2  
(ii)  Decision on Procedures leading to the ver ification and certification of HS96 changes 
relating to the schedules of 64 Members (WT/L/756) - Report by the Chairman ....................... 2  
3.  Introduction of Harmonized System 2002 changes to schedules of concessions 
using the CTS Database (WT/L/605) - Report by the Secretariat on the status of 
work .......................................................................................................................... .................. 3  
4.  Introduction of Harmonized System 2007 changes to schedules of concessions 
using the CTS Database (WT/L/673) - Review of the situation ............................................ 3  
5.  Introduction of the Harmonized System 2012 (HS 2012) changes - Correlation 
tables (G/MA/W/105) ........................................................................................................... ..... 4 
6.  Modalities and operation of the Integrated Data Base (IDB) ............................................... 4  
(i)  Status of submission of the required documentation (G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.33) .............................. 4  
(ii)  Report by the Secretariat ..................................................................................................... ....... 5 
7.  Consolidated Tariff Schedules (CTS) Data base -- Report by the Secretariat ..................... 5  
8.  Decision on notification procedures for quantitative restrictions (G/L/59) - 
Report by the Chairman ........................................................................................................ .. 6 
9.  Other Busi ness ................................................................................................................ ........... 6 
(i)  Situation of Schedules of Members .............................................................................................  6 
(ii)  Proposed derestriction of certain bilatera l negotiating documentation  relating to 
earlier GATT Rounds of negotiations ......................................................................................... 6  
(iii) Date of the next meeting ...................................................................................................... ....... 7 
10.  Election of the Chairperson ................................................................................................... .. 7 
 
 The Committee adopted the agenda as reproduced in WTO/AIR/3744.  An a nnotated agenda 
was circulated in document JOB/MA/90. 
 G/MA/M/53 
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  1. Periodic report of the Committee to the Council for Trade in  Goods (G/MA/SPEC/47) 
1.1 The Chairman drew attention to document G/MA/SPEC/47 which contained the draft periodic 
report of the Committee.  He noted that this repor t, which would be finalized in the light of the 
discussion that would take place at this meeting,  would be submitted to the Council for Trade in 
Goods (CTG) for examination.  He noted that the report contained a table in its Annex summarizing 
factual information on the waiver submitted by Arge ntina.  Argentina had forwarded its request for a 
waiver extension in connection with the introduction of HS96 changes to its schedule of concessions.  
This request had been circulated as document G/ L/956 and the draft decision extending the waiver 
was contained in G/C/W/648.  
1.2 The Committee took note of the periodic report and the statement and agreed to forward the 
request for waiver extension (G/L/956) as well as the draft waiver decision (G/C/W/648) to the CTG 
for appropriate action.  
2. Introduction of HS96 changes to schedules of concessions 
(i) Submission of HS96 documentation 
2.1 The Chairman drew the Committee's attention to document G/MA/TAR/2/Rev.46 which 
reflected the present situation concerning the s ubmission of documentation required pursuant to the 
procedures which were adopted in 1991 by the GATT Council (L/6905) in order to introduce HS changes to schedules of concessions.  The main m odification introduced to this document was the 
recording of the new situation pertaining to Arge ntina's documentation where an addendum had been 
circulated.  Footnote 2 was also deleted which signall ed that there were no more reservations on that 
documentation.  So under aforementioned proced ures, the documentation of only two Members 
remained open: Venezuela's where feedback was aw aited from capital; and Australia's where relevant 
domestic approval still needed to be secured on the documentation.  
2.2 The representative of Switzerland wondered whet her Australia could give an indication of 
when it expected to complete its internal procedur es. She also asked whether Venezuela could give an 
indication of the status of its technical correction.   2.3 The Committee took note of the document and the statement. 
 (ii) Decision on Procedures leading to the verification and certification of HS96 changes relating 
to the schedules of 64 Members (WT/L/756) - Report by the Chairman 
2.4 The Chairman reminded the Committee that pur suant to a decision contained in WT/L/756, 
the Committee on Market Access had met in an in formal dedicated session on 2 December 2010 to 
hold a multilateral review of the HS96 changes relating to the schedules of 64 Members.  The 
situation to date was that 61 out of the 64 HS96 fil es were now certified.  The three open files were 
South Africa's on which there were still questions from the US; Ecuador's file which still had to be 
finalized and Bangladesh's file which had been a pproved and circulated but whose certification was 
not carried out because errors were detected in the file. Once the erro rs had been corrected, the file 
would have to come back for multilateral review.   
2.5 The Committee took note of the report. 
  G/MA/M/53 
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  3. Introduction of Harmonized System 2002 chan ges to schedules of concessions using the 
CTS Database (WT/L/605) - Report by the Secretariat on the status of work 
3.1 A member of the Secretariat (Ms Alya Belkhodj a) briefly summarised the work being carried 
out on the HS2002 files.  A revised full report was issued as JOB/MA/42/Rev.1 dated 
29 November 2010. The status of the HS02 transpositi on was:  99 HS02 files were certified or in the 
process of being certified; 13 HS02 files were re leased for multilateral review and had comments 
from other Members; one HS02 file was released a nd had to be examined at the next multilateral 
review; three draft HS02 files had been completed a nd sent to Members for their first review; and two 
draft HS02 files remained to be prepared.  
3.2 Regarding the certification of files that were approved, she pointed out that the amendment to 
the HS02 procedures (WT/L/807) had enabled significant progress to be made in the certification process.   3.3 The representative of the United States stated th at it was important to finalize the work on the 
HS02 files, particularly given that the WCO would be introducing new changes to the HS effective on 
1 January 2012 and Members ha d not yet begun work on the HS07 transposition exercise.  
 3.4 The representative of India thanked the Secretar iat for inputs on certain reservations that India 
had raised on its HS02 file.  India was still working on the revisions suggested by the Secretariat and 
the proposed changes and would be reverting to the Secretariat in due course.  His delegation 
presumed that India's files would only be put up for multilateral review once India had given final 
consent to the changes that ha d been introduced to its file. 
 3.5 The Committee took note of the report and the statements. 
 4. Introduction of Harmonized System 2007 chan ges to schedules of concessions using the 
CTS Database (WT/L/673) - Review of the situation 
4.1 The Chairman recalled that the Committee, at its meeting on 29 April 2010, had decided to 
continue with the suspension of the Harmonized Sy stem 2007 (HS07) transposition work and to revert 
to the question at a subsequent meeting.     
4.2 A member of the Secretariat (Ms Alya Bel khodja) noted that the HS02 transposition exercise 
was now well advanced and would continue to progress with limited resources.  By the end of the 
summer, the Secretariat should have more resources to start the HS07 transposition exercise.     4.3 The representative of the United States believe d that it was important for the Committee to 
begin the HS07 transposition work. However, th e Committee needed to discuss how to handle 
products on which there was no consensus in th e WCO on the correlation between HS02 and HS07. 
 4.4 The representative of Switzerland noted that  on several tariff positions there was no 
agreement in the WCO about the correlation betw een the HS02 and HS07 nomenclatures. So given 
this situation, she wondered whether it was se nsible to start the HS07 transposition work. 
 
4.5 The Chairman proposed that  the Committee take note of the statements and agree to the 
course of action around which there seemed be some sort of convergence.  If acceptable, he also 
proposed that the Committee agr ee to the suggestion made.   
 
4.6 The Committee so agreed. 
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  4.7 The Chairman further proposed that th e Secretariat prepare, for the Committee's 
consideration, an amendment to the existing HS07 procedures along the lines of the amendment to the 
HS02 procedures that were adopted by the Genera l Council in December 2010 and which had greatly 
expedited the work in respect of the HS02 transposition exercise.   
4.8  The Committee so agreed. 
 
5. Introduction of the Harmonized System 2012 (HS 2012) changes - Correlation tables 
(G/MA/W/105) 
5.1 The Chairman drew the Committee's atte ntion to G/MA/W/105, which contained the 
correlation tables for the harmonized system changes wh ich were to be introduced on 1 January 2012.  
He recalled that at the April 2010 Committee meeting, a member of the WCO Secretariat had presented the HS2012 changes to the Committee.  Th e correlation tables were prepared by the WCO 
Secretariat to facilitate the implementation of th ese forthcoming changes and were a working tool 
with no legal basis.   
 
5.2 Looking at the work that these new chang es would entail for Members and thinking a little 
ahead of time perhaps, he wished to propose that the Secretariat prepare for the Committee's 
consideration two documents.  The first one woul d relate to the "Procedures to introduce HS2012 
changes to schedules of concessions using the CTS data base".  He suggested that the Secretariat base 
itself on the HS02 and HS07 procedures and the recent amendment to the HS02 procedures.  
 
5.3 The second document to be elaborated wa s the draft waiver decision which would 
accommodate the situation of Members who woul d apply the HS2012 nomenclature nationally on 
1 January 2012, who believed that such changes would have an impact on their WTO schedules but 
who would not be in a position to complete the n ecessary WTO procedures by that date.  He proposed 
that in preparing the draft decision, the Secretaria t should use what was already available in the shape 
of the HS02 and HS07 waiver decisions.   5.4 While elaborating the procedures at this st age might seem premature, his sense was that 
Members would move more quickly on the HS07 exercise than had been the case of the HS02 exercise. As a result, Members should be able to start the HS2012 exercise by 2013 at the latest. The 
objective should be to keep up with these changes ra ther than lagging behind.  In this connection, he 
noted that the next set of changes would come in to force in 2017.   5.5 The Committee took note of the statement a nd agreed to the Chairman's proposals.  
 
6. Modalities and operation of the Integrated Data Base (IDB) 
(i) Status of submission of the required documentation (G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.33) 
6.1 The Chairman drew attention to document G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.33 which contained information 
on the status of submissions of the required documentation. 
 6.2 A member of the Secretariat (Ms Antonia Diakantoni) noted that the 2011 import statistics of 
the West African Economic and Monetary Union countries (Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire, 
Guinea Bissau, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo) we re erroneously recorded in the Status of 
Submission document. A corrigendum would be issued.  
 
6.3 She reported on the progress made on the im plementation of the Committee's decision of 
13 July 2009, G/MA/239, to enhance IDB notifica tions compliance.  Since the adoption of the 
Decision, the Secretariat had contacted 59 delegati ons and had managed to include tariff and/or  G/MA/M/53 
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  import data in the IDB for 52 Members.  The Secr etariat, according to the procedures and timetable 
which were laid down in section 3 of that Decisi on, had sourced the data from national governmental 
websites, from regional integration agreements' secr etariats and from the inte rnational organisations 
ITC and UN Comtrade. 
 6.4 On IDB dissemination, 1135 country -periods covering all 125 WTO Members
1 and eight 
acceding countries, were now available on the IDB websites Tariff Analysis Online (TAO) and File 
Transfer Facility (FTF).  
 
6.5 The Committee took note of the document and the statements. 
 (ii) Report by the Secretariat 
6.6 A member of the Secretariat (Ms Antonia Diakantoni) reported on technical assistance and 
software development.  
 
6.7 On technical assistance since the last meeti ng of the Committee in October 2010, IDB and the 
Consolidated Tariff Schedules (CTS) database were presented at national workshops in:  Botswana; 
Indonesia; Oman and Viet Nam; and at the followi ng regional NAMA workshops in: Indonesia for the 
Asian economies; Jamaica for the Caribbean countri es; and Kenya for the English speaking Africa.  
The IDB and CTS database were also presented in the Advanced Trade Policy Course in Geneva, in 
the Regional Trade Policy Course in Benin and in Sw aziland, in the Reference Centres Symposium in 
Geneva and in the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva.  
 6.8 Concerning software developments, a new vers ion of TAO (Tariff Analysis Online) would be 
made available in June.  It would include a new feature (data export) only available to government 
users to download IDB tariff and import files, CTS fi les and the IDB reference database in MS Access 
or XML format.   Government users would be able to download multiple files in one go.  For instance 
it would be possible to download all of the most recent ly loaded files together.   This would save time 
as users would no longer need to download IDB and CTS files one-by-one using the IDB/CTS File 
Transfer Facility.  However, the CTS transposition fi les would be only available via the File Transfer 
Facility.  
6.9 The Committee took note of the report. 
 
7. Consolidated Tariff Schedules (CTS) Da tabase -- Report by the Secretariat   
7.1 A member of the Secretariat (Ms. Alya Be lkhodja) noted that the technical assistance 
activities described in respect of the IDB under the previous item also covered the CTS database.   
 
7.2 She reported that the number of CTS files available in the new CTS formats in HS02 nomenclature described in JOB/MA/13/Rev.1 had pr ogressed since the last meeting.  There were 
currently 110 CTS files in HS02 (including certified files as well as uncertified files) posted on the 
FTF site. 
 
7.3 A new release of the CTS CD-ROM would be i ssued by early July wh ich would include for a 
large majority of Members CTS files in HS02 nomenclature with certified HS02 changes.  7.4 The Committee took note of the report.  
                                                      
 1 The information provided by the European Communities c overed its 27 member States as of 1 January 2007; the 
information provided by Switzerl and covered also Liechtenstein.  G/MA/M/53 
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  8. Decision on notification procedures for quant itative restrictions (G/L/59) - Report by the 
Chairman 
8.1 The Chairman recalled that as part of the wo rk on improving the timeliness and completeness 
of notifications, the Committee had been worki ng for some time now on a new decision for the 
notification of Quantitative Restrictions that would replace the existing one in G/L/59.  Since his last 
report made at the formal meeting of the Comm ittee that took place 11 October 2010 (G/MA/M/52), 
the Secretariat had prepared a draft decision in document JOB/MA/71, which was circulated at the end of November 2010, together with a sample notification in JOB/MA/72.   He had held a 
small-group consultation on 18 Februa ry 2011 to receive preliminary feedback on these documents.  
The comments were generally positive and some delega tions made useful sugg estions to improve the 
language.  The Secretariat prepared a revised dr aft decision based on these suggestions, which was 
circulated on 12 April 2011 as JOB/MA/71/Rev.1.  A non-paper was available at the back of the room 
where the Secretariat described the changes from one version to the other.  He held a second small 
group consultation on 15 April 2011.  Members gene rally welcomed the new version of the draft 
decision and made further suggestions to improve it.   For example, there was a proposal to have the 
notification of changes "as soon as possible but not later than 6 months from the entry into force".   
 8.2 He believed that considerable progress had b een made and that positions were not that far 
apart, so it should be possible to finalize the details  of the draft decision in the coming months.   He 
proposed that consultations continue on the draft decision with a view to finalizing it as soon as 
possible.   
 
8.3 The representative of the United States wished to highlight that her delegation continued to 
have some concerns with the revised document notab ly with respect to the mention of the non-WTO 
Agreements as well as the reference or examples of the SPS and TBT Agreements included in the 
draft. As she understood it, the transparency provisi ons of the SPS Agreement we re very thorough.  In 
addition, there was some concern that too many WT O Committees were beginning to interfere in the 
SPS Committee's activities. So her delegation wondered whether it would not be best to not include 
the particular references in the draft.  Her de legation intended to provi de some written comments 
shortly.   8.4 The Committee took note of the report and the statements and agreed that consultations 
should be pursued on the draft decision. 
 
9. Other Business 
(i) Situation of Schedules of Members  
9.1 The Chairman drew the Committee's attenti on to a document prepared by the Secretariat 
entitled "Situation of Schedules of Members" which was circulated in G/MA/W/23/Rev.7.    Its 
usefulness derived from the fact that it compiled in one place all the legal instruments relating to each 
Member's schedule.   9.2 The Committee took note of the document.  
 (ii) Proposed derestriction of certain bilateral ne gotiating documentation  relating to earlier 
GATT Rounds of negotiations  
9.3 The Chairman recalled that he had made a report on this at the last meeting of the Committee 
in October 2010.   The situation today was that out  of the 28 Members who had been contacted on the 
subject, 19 Members had signed authorizations to de restrict their negotiating material.  There were  G/MA/M/53 
 Page 7 
 
 
  some Members who had indicated that they would also  be sending their authorization very soon.    He 
thanked all Members for their co-operation on this matter.    9.4 The representative of Brazil stated that he hope d to submit the authorization letter by the end 
of the week.  
 
9.5 The representative of Pakistan informed Members that he would be submitting the 
authorization letter very soon.    9.6 The representative of the European Union indi cated that his delegation would also be in a 
position to authorize derestriction soon.  
 9.7 As a way of facilitating the process, the Chairman  proposed that if the Secretariat did not hear 
from Members by the end of June, it would be assum ed that they could accept their material being 
derestricted.   This proposed change in the proce dure would assist capitals to focus on the issue and to 
give feedback as required to their representatives in  Geneva.  For the information of the Committee, 
he noted that the following Members had signed authorization letters: Australia; Canada; Chile; 
Colombia; Cuba, Dominican Republic; India; Japan; Korea; New Zealand; Nicaragua; Norway; Peru; 
Philippines; South Africa; Sri Lanka; Turkey; United States; and Uruguay   9.8 The representative of the European Union unde rstood the wish to accelerate the procedure but 
still saw the necessity of giving explicit consent.  
 9.9 The Committee took note of the statements. 
  
(iii)   Date of the next meeting 
9.10 The Committee took note that its next mee ting would take place on 14 October 2011.  
 
10. Election of the Chairperson 
10.1 The Committee elected Mr Atilla Bastirmaci (Turkey) as its new Chairman.  
 
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