WTO’s multiple regulations on e-commerce and their impact
On March 26, 1997, member states of the World Trade Organization (WTO) signed the “Information Technology Agreement” (ITA), requiring all parties to exchange major information technology products from July 1 of that year. Tariffs dropped to zero. In July of the same year, at the ministerial conference held in Bonn, 29 countries agreed to implement the principles of free trade in the field of e-commerce, and countries were not allowed to set up their own tariffs and non-tariff barriers. On May 20, 1998, the WTO reached the Geneva Agreement to exempt software and goods delivered for use on the Internet from tariffs. On May 29 of the same year, the WTO adopted the “Declaration on Global Electronic Commerce”, requiring “members to maintain their current practices and not impose tariffs on electronic transactions.”
Most countries believe that the key issue that needs to be resolved first is whether e-commerce rules should be classified under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) or the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), or should be established in another category. At relevant WTO meetings, more and more countries believe that GATT is still applicable to physically transported goods, but GATS should apply to goods transported electronically.
The WTO Secretariat summarized the main difference between the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and the General Agreement on Trade in Services: national treatment under GATT is a comprehensive obligation, while GATS is based on the commitments made by members in various sectors; GATT prohibits taking Quantitative restriction measures, GATS allows the use of quantitative restriction measures; GATT allows the use of future Imports that bind their tariff levels to zero impose tariffs, and GATS no longer involves tariffs or general taxes, except that any tax system must be consistent with members’ commitments in their schedules of specific commitments; GATT focuses on cross-border trade in goods, while GATS also involves issues such as commercial presence and movement of natural persons outside of cross-border trade.
E-commerce is a business mechanism based on online electronic exchange and must be based on the Internet and telecommunications systems. But in most countries, telecommunications services and Internet access services are monopolistically controlled markets. According to Article 8 of the General Agreement on Trade in Services, telecommunications service providers in a monopoly position may not discriminate against foreign access service providers. In addition, the “Telecommunications Annex” in the Uruguay Round Final Act stipulates that member states shall provide each other with conditions of reasonable and non-discriminatory treatment for access to and use of public telecommunications transmission networks and services. The Basic Telecommunications Agreement promulgated in 1997 further promoted market opening in the basic telecommunications field.
The WTO’s protection of e-commerce intellectual property rights is mainly provided for in the 1995 Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS Agreement). The TRIPS agreement stipulates that a computer program, whether a source program or an object program, must be protected in the same way as a work. In terms of copyright protection, TRIPS lists computer programs and original data compilations as objects of copyright protection. The TRIPS Agreement strengthens the protection of well-known trademarks. In terms of patent protection, subject to certain exceptions or conditions, any invention, whether a product or method, that is novel and creative in all technical fields and can be put into industrial application may be patented.