This is one of the latest agreements from the WTO, and has been most strongly supported by the most developed countries. The member countries are, however, willing to allow a ten to twenty percent of advantage for domestic producers. Croatian negotiators believe that a compromise is possible, and some measures could be implemented gradually. Zero customs could be reached in five years for most goods, while the protective customs fees for some good, such as paper and some ferrous metallurgy products, could be gradually decreased, but never completely annulled. However, the most interest has been expressed lately for privatisation of the telecommunication system, where Croatian seems to be living up to its obligation to annul the domestic monopoly in the field of fixed telephony by the year 2003.
Negotiations regarding the trade of services seem to be in the final stage as well.
But, it is unrealistic to expect that member countries of the working group will give formal approval to the Croatian offer regarding the trade system, at least not until all negotiations regarding customs privileges are brought to an end. And it is highly likely that bringing the bilateral negotiations to an end will result in the conclusion of multilateral negotiations. While the negotiations on lower customs fees for import of industrial products and the liberalisation of the service trade are in their final stage, and an agreement with the fifteen countries that expressed interest in negotiations is close at hand, negotiations about privileged custom rates for imports of agricultural products are just beginning. The first rounds were of a more tactical nature, and merely consisted of one side testing the other. The USA, did not even want to enter negotiations after the first Croatian bids, believing them to be non-realistic, and considered the customs rates for import of agricultural products suggested by the Croatians too high to even consider.