RESTRICTEDWORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/MA/M/34
6 November 2003
(03-5921 )
Committee on Market Access
MINUTES OF THE MEETING HELD ON 26 MARCH 2003
Chairperson: Jo Lomas (United Kingdom)
Agenda of the meeting             Page
1. Election of the Chairperson .................................................................................................. ...1
2. Periodic report of the Committee to the Council for Trade in Goods including
factual information on waivers expiring on 30 April 2003 (G/MA/SPEC/23).....................2
3. Submission of HS96 documentation (G/MA/TAR/2/Rev.30)................................................2
4. Submission of HS2002 documentation (G/MA/TAR/4/Rev.3)..............................................35. Modalities and operation of the Integrated Data Base (IDB) ...............................................3
(i) Status of submission of the required  documentation  (G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.16) .............................3
(ii) Report by th e Secretariat .................................................................................................. ..........4
6. Consolidated Tariff Schedules  (CTS) Database - Report by the Secretariat ......................4
7. Dissemination of the IDB and the CTS Database ..................................................................58. Other Business............................................................................................................... ............6
(i) Submission of na tional ta riffs .............................................................................................. .......6
(ii) Notifications of quantitat ive restrictio ns (QRs)..........................................................................6
(iii) Date of the next meeting .................................................................................................. ...........6
The above agenda as reproduced in document WTO/AIR/2053 dated 14 March 2003 was
adopted with the inclusion of three items under "other business": submission of national tariffs;
notifications of quantitative restrictions and date of the next meeting; and a change in the order of
business. The Committee agreed to take up consideration of item H "Election of the Chairperson"
before item A "Periodic report of the Committee to  the Council for Trade in Goods", thereby allowing
the incoming Chair to continue the rest of the meeting.  An annotated agenda was circulated in aninformal document (JOB (03)/58) dated 17 March 2003.
1. Election of the Chairperson
1.1 The Chairman stated that the Rules of Procedure for meetings of the Committee on Market
Access provided that the Committee elect a Chairperson at the end of the first meeting of the new
year.  The Chairman of the Council for Trade in Goods had completed consultations on a slate of
names for appointment as chairpersons of standing bodies in accordance with the established
guidelines for appointment for officers.  On the basis of the understanding reached, he proposed that
the Committee elect Ms. Jo Lomas (United Kingdom) as Chairperson of the Committee on Market
Access by acclamation.G/MA/M/34
Page 2
1.2 The Committee so agreed and elected Ms. Jo Lomas as Chairperson of the Committee on
Market Access.
1.3 The incoming Chairperson proposed holding informal consultations for the position of Vice-
Chairperson of the Committee.
The Committee so agreed.
2. Periodic report of the Committee to the Council for Trade in Goods including factual
information on waivers expiring on 30 April 2003 (G/MA/SPEC/23)
2.1 The Chairperson drew the attention of the Committee to document G/MA/SPEC/23 which
contained the draft periodic report of the Committee on Market Access.  This report, which would be
finalized in the light of the discussion to take place at this meeting, would be submitted to the Councilfor Trade in Goods for examination.  As was customary, the report contained in its Annexes I and II,
tables summarizing factual information on the waivers under process submitted by the Members
concerned.  In this context, the Chairperson requested the Committee to take note of the requests that
had been presented by these Members concerning their respective waivers and of the reasons for
doing so.   All the waivers were to expire on 30 April 2003.
2.2 As noted in Annex I of the document G/MA/ SPEC/23,  to date eight Members had forwarded
requests for waiver extensions in connection with the introduction of HS96 changes to their schedules
of concessions. Factual information had been provided by those Members concerning their request
and  draft decisions had also been circulated.
2.3 The representative of Israel stated that Israel needed an extension of the waiver related to the
introduction of HS96 changes as there was still a reservation pending by the European Communities
on Israel's documentation.  Unfortunately, Israel had not been able to submit its request for a waiver
extension before the meeting but his delegation had already sent the necessary documentation to theSecretariat which would be circulated shortly. He hoped that the Members would  endorse Israel's
request for a waiver extension in order for Israel to take the necessary steps to remove the pending
reservation in the very near future.
2.4 The representative of Panama stated that Panama had requested an extension of its HS96
waiver. It had made this request in order to continue consultations with four Members and make the
appropriate changes to its documentation.  Panama hoped that this request would be accepted by
Members.
2.5 The Chairperson noted that details concerning Sri Lanka's request for a waiver extension for
the purpose of establishing a new schedule was contained in Annex II of document G/MA/SPEC/23.
The request and the draft decision related to this extension had been circulated.
2.6 The Committee took note of the comments made and agreed  to forward the draft decisions,
including the recent one from Israel, to the Council for Trade in Goods.
3. Submission of HS96 documentation (G/MA/TAR/2/Rev.30)
3.1 The Chairperson drew the attention of the Committee to document G/MA/TAR/2/Rev.30
which reflected the present situation concerning the submission of required documentation.  From the
document, it could be noted that the submissions of nine Members remained pending due to ongoing
consultations and/or negotiations.
3.2 She indicated that at the last formal meeting held on 23 September 2002, the Committee had
agreed that they would hold an informal meeting of the Committee to review the status of HS96G/MA/M/34
Page 3
submissions based on the informal list prepared by the Secretariat.  Unfortunately, due to the heavy
work load and scarcity of meeting rooms and interpreters it had been difficult to organize such a
meeting prior to this formal meeting.  However, sh e proposed that such a meeting be held in the near
future.  If agreed, a Revision 14 of the informal list detailing the situation of HS96 submissions would
be issued by the Secretariat along with the fax convening this meeting.
3.3 The Committee so agreed.
4. Submission of HS2002 documentation (G/MA/TAR/4/Rev.3)
4.1 The Chairperson referred to document G/MA/TAR/4/Rev.3 which reflected the situation with
respect to the circulation of HS2002 documentation. Delays had been encountered with respect to the
issuance of verification sheets, and in this regard, she invited the Secretariat to provide an update as to
the status of the verification exercise of HS2002 submissions.
4.2 A member of the Secretariat (Mrs. D. Probst) stated that there had been a backlog in the
processing of HS2002 submissions as a result of some resource constraints in the Secretariat.
However, work had been rapidly progressing in the recent weeks and the Secretariat had currently
processed 19 of the submissions.  Of those 19, four were in the process of being issued as formaldocuments and the remaining 15 would  be issued shortly thereafter.  In particular, the Secretariat
noted the concerns raised by one Member in particular in a previous meeting regarding the urgency of
the verification of its HS2002 documentation for reasons of its domestic process.  This Member's
verification would be one of the first four to be issued.  The Secretariat was working as quickly as
possible to finalise the outstanding submissions.
4.3 The representative of Japan informed the Committee that it had submitted in February 2003 a
corrigendum to its draft schedule incorporating HS2002 changes, as indicated in document
G/MA/TAR/4/Rev.3, page 3. The corrigendum contained 12 corrections that were of a technical
nature.  Among the 12 corrections, four were related to editorial changes in the main schedule text andthe remaining eight were related to changes in  the pharmaceutical annexes.  Japan was ready to
provide any further clarification on the corrigendum should the Secretariat or any Member require it.
Japan continued to have concerns over the delay in the HS2002 exercise, especially about the
significant delay in the production of electronic verification sheets because of resource constraints on
the part of the Secretariat.  Japan, therefore, requested the Secretariat to take necessary measures,including reinforcing Secretariat staff dealing with the electronic verification, so as to accelerate this
exercise.  Japan also requested Members to confirm, at this formal meeting, an informal
understanding that had emerged during informal meetings regarding the issue of giving priority to
Japan's schedule in producing the verification sheets.  Japan's reasons for requesting such treatment
had been explained at the last formal meeting in September 2002 and recorded in the minutes of that
meeting.  Japan hoped that the Committee would understand its difficult situation.  Japan requested
the Secretariat to proceed expeditiously with the somewhat delayed, but required electronicverification of Japan's draft schedule as amended by the aforementioned corrigendum.
4.4 The Committee took note of the statements made.
5. Modalities and operation of the Integrated Data Base (IDB)
(i) Status of submission of the required documentation  (G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.16)
5.1 The Chairperson stated that Document G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.16 had been circulated to all
Members.  This document presented the situation of IDB submissions as of 12 March 2003.  Due to a
small technical problem there had been a mix-up in the footnote numbering. A corrigendum document
had been issued as G/MA/IDB/2/Rev.16/Corr.1.G/MA/M/34
Page 4
Since the document had been finalized the following new submissions had been received:
Australia -- applied tariffs for 2003
Hong Kong, China   -- imports for 2002 and applied tariffs for 2003
Oman -- imports for 1997-2001 (of which 2001 is a revision)
Switzerland -- imports for 2002 and applied tariffs for 2003Thailand -- imports for 2001 and applied tariffs for 2001 and 2002
Tonga -- imports for 2000 and 2001
 (country in accession)
5.2 The Chairperson noted that the participation in the IDB had by now reached 102 Members
and six countries in accession.  Compared to September 2002 this was an increase of nine Members
and two additional countries in accession. She reminded Members that the deadline for furnishing the2003 tariff information was 30 March 2003, and for the 2002 import information it was
30 September 2003
(ii) Report by the Secretariat
5.3 A member of the Secretariat (Ms. R. Jackson) gave a brief report on the work done on the
IDB.  She stated that the full report would be faxed to all Heads of Delegations after the meeting and
would be included in the minutes (Annex 1). IDB and CTS data had been extensively used by the
Secretariat since the last formal meeting of the Committee on Market Access, for example, in
preparing Members' tariff profiles and in analysing the various formulae Members had put forward as
modalities for tariff negotiations. IDB and CTS data had already been used as input into the newWTO World Trade Report and to calculate statistical indicators for monitoring the implementation of
the UN Millennium Declaration Goals.  Since September 2002, there had been two national and two
regional activities on the IDB.  The regional activities were undertaken in collaboration with the
Market Access Division.  Further joint Statistics Division/Market Access Division regional activities
had been planned for 2003 and the next two activities would be in Sri Lanka and in the Philippines.  Amodule presenting the IDB and the CTS had been included in the market access section of the DDA
training courses for senior government officials.  As a result of initiatives taken by the Negotiating
Group on Market Access to improve IDB participation, a number of updated submissions had been
supplied to the Secretariat and one new participant had been registered.  On software applications
there had been two new developments.  The first was a new version of the IDB internet analysisprototype which it was hoped woul d be deployed in April 2003.  The new version had a completely
redesigned appearance and a number of new reports and functionalities.  With the April deployment
the Secretariat would also update the internet analys is facility (IAF) with the latest data and then
continue to update it on a monthly basis. The Statistical Division intended to organise a demonstration
of the new version of the IAF as soon as the new a pplication and data were deployed and they would
inform the Committee of the date and time of the demonstration. Secondly, work would soon begin on
ensuring that all Members, particularly developing and least developed Members, could use the IAFeffectively for their trade policy work, i.e. work would start on developing French and Spanish
versions of the IAF.  In addition, to address the significant problem of poor internet connections in
many countries, the Division would develop a portable version of the application which could be
distributed on CD-Roms or DVDs.
5.4 The Committee took note of the Secretariat's report.
6. Consolidated Tariff Schedules  (CTS) Database - Report by the Secretariat
6.1 A member of the Secretariat (Ms. R. Jackson) made a brief report on the CTS Database.  The
full report would be circulated to delegations at the meeting and would be included in the minutes
(Annex 2). There were now 128 Members' CTS files in the database.  CTS files for two newly
acceded Members, Armenia and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia remained outstandingG/MA/M/34
Page 5
as they had yet to be processed and included in the database.  On-going work covered updating
activities, responding to Members' comments and preparations for linking the CTS database and the
IDB.  On the link, preparations had started for the 62 Members who had 2000 or 2001 applied tariffs
in the IDB.  IDB-CTS correlation tables for 42 of those Members had been prepared and the
remaining 20 were expected to be completed by the end of April 2003.  The situation with respect to
the remaining 66 CTS files was that correlation tables could be prepared for a further 19 Members butonly for years prior to 2000 and correlation tables could not be prepared for 47 Members' files for a
number of reasons.  With the completion of the IDB/CTS correlation tables plus finalization of some
software that was currently being tested, the Secretariat could, if authorised, generate the final bound
duties from a Member's CTS file into its IDB tariff file, for example,  as was suggested by Australia
with respect to its own CTS/IDB files at the la st meeting of the Committee.  With regard to
dissemination, the first CTS CD-Rom had been distributed to Members in January 2003.  At least two
of the CTS CD-Roms would be issued in June at the same time as the release of 10 IDB CD-Roms.
6.2 The representative of the United States stated that it was important that the linkage of the CTS
and IDB files was becoming a real possibility.6.3 The Committee took note of the Secretariat's report and of the statement made.
7. Dissemination of the IDB and the CTS Database
- Communication from OECD (G/MA/W/43)
- Communication from FAO (G/MA/W/47)
7.1 The Chairperson stated that on 12 June 2002 the Market Access Committee had adopted
document G/MA/115 containing the dissemination po licy of the IDB and CTS database. Certain
organizations (UNCTAD, IMF, World Bank and IT C) were given automatic access to these two
databases. However, the Committee had agreed that  other intergovernmental organizations wishing to
have access would need to obtain approval from the Committee on a case-by-case basis. This wascontained in paragraph 5 of document G/MA/115. The Committee had before it requests for access to
these two databases from the OECD and the F AO, contained in documents G/MA/W/43 and
G/MA/W/47, respectively.  Both organizations ha d undertaken to use and publish the information
contained in these databases in accordance with the terms and conditions laid out in document
G/MA/115. Both had also indicated that access to su ch data would be very useful in the context of
technical assistance. In light of the above the Chairperson proposed that the Committee consider these
requests.
7.2 The Committee agreed to the requests from the OECD and the FAO.
7.3 The representative of Brazil stated that his delegation hoped that any future request from
intergovernmental organizations which provided assistance to Members, particularly to developing
country Members, would also be considered as expeditiously as these two requests.
7.4 The representative of the Philippines shared Brazil comments that requests from organizations
that were of particular importance to developing  countries would be approved expeditiously.  She
enquired whether the Secretariat had received any feedback from existing authorised users of thedatabases, for example, IMF, World Bank, ITC, UN and UNCTAD.
7.5 A member of the Secretariat (Mr. J. Richtering) stated that there had been some cooperation
and use of this data by some of these organisations, in particular, by ITC and UNCTAD.  The WTO
had collaborated with ITC and UNCTAD in providing statistics for the Millennium Declaration Goalsand it had been very important to be able to share full detailed data with both ITC and UNCTAD for
that collaboration.  The World Bank was working on including the IDB and CTS data in its
application while respecting the dissemination policy of no dissemination beyond 6 digits.G/MA/M/34
Page 6
7.6 The representative of Djibouti stated that he agreed with the statements made by some
delegations that requests from intergovernmental organisations dealing with development issues and
technical assistance should be viewed favourably.
7.7 The Committee took note of the statements made.
8. Other Business
(i) Submission of national tariffs
8.1 The Chaiperson drew the Committee's attention to document G/MA/TAR/3/Rev.8 and its
corrigendum, entitled “Tariff Information available in the Secretariat”. The Secretariat was made
aware of two further changes which needed to be  made to the corrigendum. The changes concerned
Norway on page 5 of the document, the year of the National Tariff should read 2003 and not 2001 and
on page 3 of the document for the United States the year of the National Tariff should read 2003 andnot 2002.  The Secretariat would issue a further corrigendum to amend those errors.  She urged
Committee Members to submit their most recent national tariffs to this library as it was frequently
consulted by the public and delegations.
8.2 The Committee took note of the statement.
(ii) Notifications of quantitative restrictions (QRs)
8.3 The Chairperson drew the Committee's atte ntion to document G/MA/NTM/QR/1/Add.9 and
its corrigendum, which provided an update of the si tuation regarding the notifications of quantitative
restrictions.  She reminded delegations that pursuant to the decision contained in G/L/59 theCommittee would be required to undertake a  review  next year of the QRs notified. Such a review
would be based on complete notifications to be made by Members of the QRs they maintained, by 31
January 2004.
8.4 The Committee took note of the statement.
(iii) Date of the next meeting
8.5 The Chairperson stated that according to the time-table of meetings established by the
Secretariat, the next meeting of the Committee was scheduled to take place on 26 June 2003 subject to
confirmation.  She proposed that the holding of such a meeting be dependent on the work load at thetime in view of Cancun.  She also proposed consulting with delegations nearer the time to see if such
a meeting was necessary. She said that the Committee would probably need to hold an informal
meeting to continue its technical work.
8.6 The Committee so agreed.G/MA/M/34
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Annex 1
Integrated Data Base
Report by the Secretariat
IDB dissemination
The Secretariat has continued to load information onto the IDB Internet site on a monthly
basis.  As of 31 March 2003, there will be 399 country periods on the site, of which 366 will be in the
approved area.  Eighty-nine Members and five acceding countries or territories are represented.
Two copies of release 9 of the IDB CD-ROM were distributed to each delegation in January
2003.  The CD-ROM contains information for 290 country-periods.
Publication of IDB and CTS data
Since the September 2003 meeting of this Committee
• The Secretariat has circulated a revised and updated version of the document on "WTO Members'
Tariff Profiles" (TN/MA/S/4/Rev.1) for the Negotiating Group on Market Access and has
provided similar information to the Agriculture Division following a request from Members in theSpecial Session on Agriculture.  This data set with agricultural tariff profile information is
currently being revised to include the latest information available in the CTS.  A brief overview
on IDB data availability ((TN/MA/S/9) was also presented to the Negotiating Group on Market
Access.
• The Statistics Division is preparing inputs for the new World Trade Report derived from IDB and
CTS information.
• The Statistics Division is also preparing an informal document on the various formulae proposals
for modalities for tariff negotiations using CTS information, for the Negotiating Group on Market
Access.
• As part of an inter-agency effort under the auspices of the United Nations, the Statistics Division
has used IDB data to calculate the statistical indicators for monitoring the implementation of the
trade-related Millennium Declaration Goals.
Technical Assistance
Since the September 2003 meeting of the Committee, Statistics Division staff have
undertaken two national IDB workshops, one in Li thuania and one in Bangladesh, and two regional
IDB workshops, one in St-Lucia for Caribbean Member countries and one in Senegal for French
speaking African Members.  The two regional activities included a component on Market Access
issues.  IDB and CTS were also presented in the DDA Training Courses for senior governmentofficials in Vienna and in Cairo.  In addition, the IDB and CTS database and analytical software were
presented at a regional workshop on trade negotiating skills held in Malaysia.
For the next quarter, the IDB section has scheduled two regional activities jointly with the
Market Access Division.  One, in Sri Lanka, will take place next week and one in the Philippines inJune/July (date to be confirmed).  The next DDA Training Courses in Beijing will also include
presentations on IDB and CTS.  Tunisia has requested that the national workshop listed in the 2003
TA plan take place during the month of May.G/MA/M/34
Page 8
Improving the coverage of the IDB
An initiative to improve the coverage of the ID B, in particular with respect to the years from
2000 onwards, was taken by the Negotiating Group on Market Access in the form of a letter sent to
Heads of Delegation from the Chairman of the Group in October 2002.  In that letter the Chairman
urged Members who were not up to date with their IDB notifications to submit outstandinginformation to the Secretariat no later than the 31 January 2003.  The Chairman also drew Members'
attention to the Secretariat document on 'Data availability and Software Tools for Tariff negotiations –
TN/MA/S/2 which clearly identified gaps in the data in the IDB and which indicated cases where
those gaps could be filled with official information lodged in databases maintained by other
intergovernmental agencies.  The Chairman went on to recall that the Secretariat could not obtain this
information without the authorization of the Member concerned, but he suggested that Members who
were not up to date with their IDB submissions could, if they wished, authorize the Secretariat to fillthe gaps in their IDB submissions with the official information in databases maintained by other
intergovernmental agencies.
As a direct result of this letter, there have been a number of improvements in the coverage of the
IDB:  Two Members (Jamaica and Oman) referred to the Chairman's letter in making their (updated)IDB submissions.  Four Members (Cameroon, Ec uador, Grenada, Sri Lanka) authorized the
Secretariat to obtain their official information fo r them, resulting in one new Member participating in
the IDB (Cameroon).  One Member (Brazil) pointed out  in its response to the Chairman's letter the
role of the Committee on Market Access as regards the functioning of the IDB.
Software development
The third release of the IDB Internet Analysis Facility (IAF) prototype software
(http://iaf.wto.org/), was deployed in November 2002.  Thus far, users from 49 developing countries
and 15 developed countries have accessed the IAF.
Since November, the Secretariat has completely redesigned the appearance of the site,
introduced a report on status of bindings (and associated downloading features), introduced a facility
to save product groups independently of the market and improved the Help facility.  This new version
will be made available in April.  At the same time, the most recent data will be loaded on the site(which will require the site to be shut down for a week to 10 days).  After that, regular loading of the
database at the ICC will take place on a monthly basis.
The Secretariat will organize a demonstration of the revised IAF for delegations as soon as the
new application and data are deployed.  The date and time of the demonstration will be circulated to
Delegations.
The IAF is currently available only in English.  The Secretariat is well aware that French and
Spanish language versions of the application are required, in particular to permit developing country
Members to effectively use the IAF for their trade policy work.  Furthermore, users in some
developing and least-developed countries face problems with Internet access, because of unreliable
connections or limited budgets for Internet access.  To address these problems, the Secretariat willbegin work on introducing a multi-language capability in the IAF.  The Secretariat will also develop a
“portable” version of the application that will operate from a “snapshot” of the database distributed on
CD-ROMs or DVDs, thus precluding the need for an Internet connection to use the IAF.G/MA/M/34
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Annex 2
Consolidated Tariff Schedules Database
Report by the Secretariat
Since the last meeting of this Committee the IDB/CTS team has been concentrating on the
following areas:
/g167 Updating Members' files by incorporating information rectifying or modifying Members'
commitments from documents issued after the creation of the initial CTS files.
/g167 Incorporating Members' comments into their CTS files.  Seven out of eight comments notified to
the Secretariat have been processed and the resulting modifications have been incorporated into
the database files.
/g167 Preparing the link between the CTS data base and the IDB.
To update you on where we stand on the link:
• The team has created the infrastructure needed to accommodate the link.  That is, a standard
IDB/CTS correlation table was created last year.  The linking of the CTS and the IDB through this
correlation table was tested last year on the files of three Members.
• The tariff concessions in the CTS files were standa rdized in order to be compatible with the IDB.
This work was completed in December 2002.
• In January this year the team started preparing the IDB/CTS correlation tables for the
62 Members who have usable 2000 or 2001 applied tariffs in the IDB.  So far, tables have beenprepared for 42 of these Members' files.  The remaining 20 are expected to be completed by the
end of April.
The position with regard to IDB/CTS correlation tables in the remaining 66 files out of the
128 Members in the CTS is as follows.
• Correlation tables could be prepared for a further 19 Members, but only for years prior to 2000.
• Correlation tables cannot be prepared for 47 Members' files for the time being, either because
tariff data have not been supplied to the IDB (42), tariff data have been supplied, but without theproduct descriptions (4); and in one case, due to incompatible tariff structure of the Members' IDB
submission and CTS file.
To be able to construct the correlation tabl es the Secretariat included tables from the
Member's IDB file in its CTS file.  These additional tables, including a table with unbound lines, have
been kept in the CTS files during the approval pr ocess in order to assist them in checking and
approving their correlation tables.  Once the CTS files containing an IDB/CTS correlation table havebeen approved, the information generated for checking purposes will be removed.
The IDB/CTS correlation tables link the CTS to the IDB for only one specific year (2000 or
2001 in the HS 1996 nomenclature).  A requirement for maintaining the link between the CTS and the
IDB, is that the IDB/CTS correlation tables have to be updated.  In this context, the IDB correlation
tables, which include the tariff nomenclature changes from one year to the next, would be required to
generate a new IDB/CTS correlation table for more recent IDB tariff submissions.
The IDB/CTS correlation tables can be used to incorporate the final bound duties from a
Member's CTS into its IDB tariff file.  The Secretariat has prepared software for this purpose, which itG/MA/M/34
Page 10
is currently testing.  When operational, the Secretariat could, if requested, incorporate Members' final
bound duties in the CTS into the IDB.  For example, to respond to the suggestion made by the
representative of Australia at the 23 September 2002 meeting of this Committee that the bound tariff
data in Australia's CTS file be imported into its IDB file.
The results of all this work have been disseminated to Members through the CTS part of the
File Transfer Facility on the IDB Internet site.  The files are either in the provisional area or the
approved area, depending on their status.  The Members concerned have been informed any time there
has been a change in their files.  Still to come are the concessions on goods of two newly acceded
Members (Armenia and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia), which have yet to be
processed and included in the database.
The first CTS CD-ROM was distributed to Members in January 2003.  It contains the
approved CTS files as of end-November 2002 in Access database and text file formats.  Release 2 of
the CTS CD ROM will be issued in June, at the same time as Release 10 of the IDB CD ROM.
Software for data analysis
Currently, there are no customised software applications for analysing the information in the
CTS database.  However, the following work is ong oing or planned for the CTS information in the
IDB Internet Analysis Facility.
• The design of Query selection parameters for CTS information
• Development of a CTS-based report on AMS commitments.
• Other reports on tariff concessions, tariff quotas and export subsidies.
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