WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  TN/MA/W/56 
29 June 2005 
 (05-2793) 
Negotiating Group on Market Access Original:   English 
  
 
MARKET ACCESS FOR NON-AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS 
 
Communication from Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic and Republic of Moldova
 
 
 The following communication, dated 15 April 2005, is being circulated at the request of the 
Delegations of Armenia, Georgia, Kyrg yz Republic and Republic of Moldova. 
_______________ 
 
Introduction 
 
1. The paragraph 38 of the Doha Declaration, as we ll as the paragraph 1.d and other sections of 
the General Council's Decision (1 August 2004) unde rline the difficulties faced by "small low-income 
economies in transition" in their efforts to impl ement economic and trade policy reforms.     
 
2. At the same time, paragraph 11 of Annex B of the same Decision instructs the Negotiating 
Group on Market Access to further elaborate on the provisions for recently acceded Members in order 
to take into account their extensive market access commitments undertaken as part of their accession 
and that staged tariff reductions are still being implemented in many cases.   
 
3. Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic and Repub lic of Moldova are newly independent states, 
which acceded to the WTO in recent years ( 1998-2003). These countries have undertaken an 
unprecedently high level of liberalization commitments in goods and services, including non-agricultural products. Two of these countries (G eorgia and Republic of Moldova) were included 
in paragraph 9 of the Doha Declaration, which recognized the extensive market access commitments 
made by those countries which had acceded to WTO just before the Doha Ministerial Conference.  
Based on the legal framework created by this paragraph the group of Recently Acceded Members was formed within the framework of WTO. Ever since Doha, Georgia and Republic of Moldova have been 
actively and constructively particip ating in the negotiating process within the framework of the group 
of RAM’s.  
 
4. This paper endeavours to high light that, in terms of development, these "small low-income 
economies in transition" are at the same stages of development, if not lower, as other developing 
countries and LDCs, but have much more stricter WTO commitments. Therefore, we request  that 
these "low-income economies in transition" be grante d special flexibilities which are identical to those 
already provided to LDCs and other vulnerable developing countries.
1 
 
The level of development and other characteristics of our economies  
 
5. According to the development statistics pr ovided by the World Bank, the annual per capita 
Gross National Income of Armenia (US$ 875) and Ge orgia (US$ 877) are at the bottom range of the 
income level for the lower-middle income countries (US$ 766-3,035 in 2003).  Both the 
                                                      
 1 Reference is made to the communication made by  a group of recently acceded Members during the 
special session of the Negotiating Gr oup on Market Access (01/02/2005) . TN/MA/W/56 
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 Kyrgyz Republic (US$ 382) and the Republic of  Moldova (US$ 542) are classified among 61 low-
income economies with a per capita GNI of less than US$ 765 in 2003.
2 Recent substantial reductions 
of import tariffs after our accession to the WTO have  led to the serious re duction of production in 
many industries and rise of unemployment in several key industrial sectors.  
6. In addition, three of our countries (Armenia , Kyrgyz Republic and Republic of Moldova) as 
landlocked countries are facing additional difficulties in economy and trade.   
7. In this context, the OECD DAC includes "low -income countries in transition" in the list of 
developing countries and territories, together with a number of African and Asian countries.
3 
8. Many developed countries such as the United St ates, Canada, the European Union, Japan and 
Switzerland extended their Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) to "low-income countries in 
transition" as to LDCs and elig ible developing countries.   
 9. According to trade statistics, our participation in world trade is really insignificant. The share 
in world total exports was as follows (in 2002-2003): Armenia – 0.01%, Georgia – 0.004%, 
Kyrgyz Republic and Republic of Moldova – 0.008% both. Since our economies are mostly 
agriculture-oriented, the share of non-agricu ltural exports is even much more lower. 
 10. The exports of our countries are destined to  a limited number of markets and concentrate on a 
very limited number of products. 
 
11. These facts underline that the economic growth  and stability of our societies as a whole are 
as, if not more, susceptible to changes in trad ing conditions as those of WTO Members which are 
considered developing countries and least-developed countries.     The level of commitments made under our terms of accession to the WTO  
12. Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic and Repub lic of Moldova have made extensive market 
access commitments under their terms of accession to the WTO heading to a substantially liberalised 
market access.   
13. Our tariff bindings on non-agricultural products are already 100 per cent. Furthermore, these 
tariffs are bound at very low levels (simple average is 6,67 per cent, see table below), as compared to the Uruguay Round final bound tariffs of developing  country and LDCs Members (simple average: 
29.4 per cent in developing countries and 45.2 per cent in LDCs).  
14. Armenia, Georgia, Kyrgyz Republic and Re public of Moldova also joined a number of 
different "zero-to-zero" and "harmonization" sectorial initiatives of the Uruguay Round.
4 
 
                                                      
2 http://www.worldbank.org/data/countryclass/OGHIST.xls  
 3 www.oecd.org/dac/stats/daclist  
 4 Armenia : agricultural equipment, chemicals, most construction equipment, medical 
equipment, most paper, pharmaceuticals, steel and ITA; Georgia:  agricultural equipment, most 
chemicals, most construction equipment, ITA, furn iture, most medical equipment, paper, steel and 
toys; Kyrgyz Republic : agricultural equipment, chemicals, most construction equipment, ITA, most 
medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, paper, steel , toys and most furniture; Republic of Moldova : 
chemicals, most medical equipment, pharmaceuticals, toys and ITA (WT/ACC/10/Rev.2). 
  TN/MA/W/56 
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 15. While we are continuing our efforts to full y implement our commitments, we do face serious 
problems in terms of adjustment costs in our hi ghly fragile economies. The rapid liberalization 
process, resulting from our accession to the WTO, has created additional structural difficulties to our 
industries and aggravated the social situation in our  countries and we need to have access to other new 
markets of developed and developing countries.  
 
16. The end of implementation periods for our terms of accession, including tariff reductions, is 
between 2005 and 2007. Hence, there is an overlap between accession commitments and new 
commitments under the Doha Round.  
Non-agricultural Products – Final Bound Tariffs 
 
  Armenia Georgia Kyrgyz Republic Republic of 
Moldova 
Reduction commitments  
Up to 2007 Up to 2005 Up to 2005 Up to 2005 
Simple average of ad 
valorem tariff bindings (%)  
7.5 
 6.5 6.7 6.0 
Distribution of ad valorem  
tariff bindings: (%)  
  
  
  
 
0 (duty-free) 39.2 23.6 22.5 25.6 
0.1-5.0 
 7.8 
 20.6 
 10.5 
 19.6 
 
5.1-10.0  11.1 
 23.4 
 58.9 
 46.4 
 
10.1-15.0 
 41.8 
 32.0 
 7.8 
 11.0 
 
15.1-20.0 
 0.0 
 0.3 
 0.0 
 0.1 
 
Share of non ad valorem 
tariff bindings (%) 0.0 
 0.0 
 0.2 
 0.0 
 
Minimum ad valorem duty 0.0 
 0.0 
 0.0 
 0.0 
 
Maximum ad valorem duty 15.0 
 20.0 
 20.0 
 20.0 
 
 
17. Simulation of the currently discussed formul as such as the Swiss formula and the so called 
"Girard" formula shows that Armenia, Georgia,  Kyrgyz Republic and Republic of Moldova would 
have to make substantial additional tariff cuts w ith much lower final bound  rates than the vast 
majority of developing country Members. That w ould cause even more serious adjustment costs to 
our vulnerable economies, since, in most cases, our applied tariffs are equal to the bound rates. Thus, 
in the medium-term, our economi es clearly need some reasonabl e and temporary flexibilities to 
improve the quality of integration into the multilatera l trading system and enhance the diversification 
of our production and export bases.   
Special flexibility for small low-income economies in transition  
 18. In this respect, we request the Negotiating Group on Market Access to agree that our 
countries be granted the same flexibilities with regard  to the non-agricultural market access as have 
already been agreed for LDCs and other vulnerable developing countries.    
19. Participation in new sectoral initia tives should be strictly voluntary.   TN/MA/W/56 
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 20. We expect that our concerns and proposals, as expressed in this paper, will be fully included 
in the modalities and implemented in the negotiations.  TN/MA/W/56 
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