Encouraging development Allowance is made for the needs of developing countries, with appropriate transition periods for new members and provisions for special assistance and trade concessions. These agreements include a new GATT, based on the original 1947 GATT, and a number of agreements on specific subjects. The only major sectors outside the new GATT are aerospace, defence and mining products. Tariffs remain relatively high in footwear and leather goods, motor vehicles, processed foods and some transport and high technology products. Tariffs on most information technology products were eliminated under a separate agreement signed in 1997 by 40 leading countries.
Tariffs are still relatively high.
A further round of negotiations in agriculture is due in 2000. Other agreements tackle non-tariff barriers based on discriminatory technical standards and health and safety measures. GATS covers all service sectors, apart from air transport, and lists the specific sectors which each country agreed to open up to international competition. It provides for further rounds of negotiations, the first of which is due in 2000. Specific agreements for telecommunications and financial services were signed in 1997.