thirtieth annual review of the
implementation and
operation of the agreement on rules of origin
note by the secretariat[1]
1 Introduction
1.1. The purpose of this note is to assist Members in undertaking the 30th
Annual Review of the implementation and operation of the Agreement on Rules of
Origin. It was prepared by the Secretariat to assist Members' during their
discussions about the implementation of the Agreement. According to Article 6.1
of the Agreement, "the Committee shall review annually the
implementation and operation of Parts II and III of this Agreement having
regard to its objectives". The Committee's Annual Report to the
Council for Trade in Goods on the Implementation and Operation of the Agreement
on Rules of Origin will incorporate the outcomes of this review.
2 Members and Observers of the Committee
on Rules of Origin
2.1. Government representatives of all WTO Members and Observers are also
Members and Observers to the Committee on Rules of Origin (CRO). Additionally,
the following international organizations have observer status at the CRO: ACP,
EFTA, IADB, IMF, ITC, OECD, UNCTAD, WCO and World Bank.
3 Rules of procedure of the Committee
on Rules of Origin
3.1. The rules of procedure for
meetings of the CRO were adopted by the Committee in February 1997 (_G/L/149
and _WT/L/161).
4 Officers of the Committee on Rules
of Origin
4.1. On 10 June 2024, Mr. Guna Seelan BALAKRISHNAN (Malaysia) was elected as the Chairperson of the CRO for the period 2024-2025.
5 Meetings of the Committee on Rules
of Origin
5.1. In 2024, the CRO held two formal
meetings: on 29 April and 21-22 November. Documents _G/RO/M/82 and _G/RO/M/83 (to be prepared), respectively, contain the minutes of these
meetings.
6 Notifications under Article 5
(non-preferential rules of origin)
6.1. Two Members, who had never submitted a notification under Article 5
of the Agreement, submitted their notifications in 2024: Cambodia (_G/RO/N/266)
and Cabo Verde (_G/RO/N/281).
6.2. As a result of these notifications, 57 WTO
Members have notified the Secretariat that they apply non-preferential rules of
origin (counting the EU and its member States as one). Sixty WTO Members have
informed the Secretariat that they do not apply any non-preferential rules of
origin. The remaining 22 WTO Members had not yet notified any information
to the WTO under Article 5.
6.3. The full list of Members
under each of these categories as well as the relevant information notified to
the WTO Secretariat is listed in three tables in Annex 1 to this note.
6.4. All notifications and the related legislation or
references provided can be accessed through the section "Non-preferential
origin/Notifications" of the Rules of Origin webpage of the WTO website (https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/roi_e/roi_e.htm).
7 Notifications under Annex II (preferential
rules of origin)
7.1. As agreed by the Committee in 2012 (_G/RO/M/59),
notifications about reciprocal trade agreements made to the Committee on
Regional Trade Agreements (CRTA) or to the Committee on Trade and Development
(CTD) are deemed to discharge Members' notification obligations under the
Agreement on Rules of Origin. The Committee therefore agreed that notifications
which had initially been received by the CRTA or the CTD should be circulated
by the Secretariat to the CRO. The information contained in such
notifications, including information about preferential rules of origin, can be
accessed through the WTO database of regional trade agreements (https://rtais.wto.org) and the WTO database
of preferential trade agreements (http://ptadb.wto.org).
7.2. In addition, it should be noted that the Committee adopted a
specific template for notifications of non-reciprocal preferential rules of
origin applied to least-developed countries (_G/RO/84).
All WTO preference-granting Members agreed to submit detailed information about
their preferential rules of origin using that template. To date, 22
preference-granting Members submitted such notifications. and three Members
still have to inform the Committee about their practices. Notifications were
circulated under the _G/RO/LDC/N/
document series. A complete overview of these notifications is available in
document _G/RO/W/163/Rev.13.
8 Origin
Facilitator
8.1. The Origin Facilitator is a publicly available, online database
containing tariff-level data about rules of origin and origin-related
procedural requirements. It is the result of a collaboration between the WTO
Secretariat and the International Trade Centre (ITC) and the World Customs
Organization (WCO). It is a user-friendly tool that allow users to retrieve
rules of origin information, including rules of origin notified to the WTO (for
instance, concerning preferential rules of origin applied to LDCs under
non-reciprocal trade arrangements). The Facilitator is available at: https://findrulesoforigin.org.
9 Work
of the Committee related to Parts I, II and III of the Agreement
9.1. Part II of the Agreement relates to the multilateral disciplines
which govern the application of non-preferential rules of origin by WTO Members
during the "transitional period".
This period refers to the time before the implementation of fully harmonized
non-preferential rules of origin (Article 2). Since the Work Programme for
the Harmonization of non-preferential rules of origin (HWP) has not yet been
finalized, Members have not adopted and do not implement harmonized
non-preferential rules of origin. Hence, Article 2 of the Agreement contains
the disciplines which currently apply to WTO Members. The Committee did not
hold discussions specifically related to these disciplines.
9.2. As had been noted in the Committee's 2013 Annual Report to the CTG (_G/L/1047),
the implementation and operation of the Agreement is not satisfactory as the
stalemate in the HWP compromises the attainment of the core objectives of the
Agreement (i.e., the facilitation of global trade through the international
harmonization of non-preferential rules of origin). The draft results of the
HWP are contained in documents _G/RO/W/111/Rev.6
(in HS96); _JOB/RO/5/Rev.1
and _JOB/RO/5/Rev.1/Corr.1
(rectified to reflect the 2002, 2007, and 2012 versions of the HS nomenclature).
In the period of this annual review, the Committee did not consider any item
specifically related to the HWP.
9.3. In 2024, Members continued to discuss ways to enhance transparency
on non-preferential rules of origin following a proposal by a group of Members
in 2019 (_G/RO/W/182/Rev.4).
At the request of Members, the Chairperson of the Committee held consultations which
led to different versions of a draft decision to be adopted by the CRO. The
decision would encourage Members to update their notifications and to use a new
notification format (template) for the preparation of such notifications (documents
_JOB/RO/8;
_JOB/RO/8/Rev.1
and _JOB/RO/8/Rev.2).
Informal consultations were held on 17 May 2024. Despite wide support, the
Chairperson reported that some concerns had been raised, and, as a result, the
decision could not be adopted. He therefore suggested that the Committee should
simply take note of the template and use it on an entirely voluntary basis (_JOB/RO/8/Rev.3).
10 Amendments,
interpretations and rectifications to the Agreement
10.1. The Committee has not dealt with any of these matters during the
year under review.
11 Consultation
and dispute settlement
11.1. Since 1995, the Agreement on Rules of Origin has been cited in the
context of the following dispute
settlement proceedings.
Table 1 - List of Disputes citing the Agreement on
Rules of Origin
|
Title
|
Date (of the latest document)
|
Articles cited
|
|
DS597
|
United States - Origin Marking Requirement -
Communication from Hong Kong, China
|
2 February 2023
|
Articles 2(c), 2(d) and 2(e)
|
|
DS384
|
United States - Certain Country of Origin Labelling
(COOL) Requirements - Communication from the European Union
|
21 December 2015
|
Article 2
|
|
DS386
|
United States - Certain Country of Origin Labelling
(COOL) Requirements - Communication from the European Union
|
11 December 2015
|
Article 2
|
|
DS342
|
China - Measures Affecting Imports of Automobile
Parts - Agreement under Article 21.3(b) of the DSU
|
3 March 2009
|
Article 2(b), 2(c) and 2(d)
|
|
DS243
|
United States - Rules of Origin for Textiles and
Apparel Products - Panel Report - Action by the Dispute Settlement Body
|
28 July 2003
|
Articles 2(b), 2(c) and 2(d)
|
|
DS151
|
United States - Measures Affecting Textiles and
Apparel Products (II) - Notification of Mutually Agreed Solution
|
24 July 2000
|
Article 2
|
|
DS85
|
United States - Measures Affecting Textiles Apparel
Products - Notification of Mutually Agreed Solution
|
11 February 1998
|
Article 4.2
|
|
DS111
|
United States - Tariff Rate Quota for Imports of
Groundnuts - Request to Join Consultations - Communication from Canada
|
19 December 1997
|
Article 2
|
12 Other
areas of work of the CRO
12.1 WTO Reform and improvements to the functioning of the CRO
12.1. At the request of the Council for Trade in Goods (CTG) (_JOB/CTG/29
and _JOB/CTG/33),
Members had adopted a report on discussions related to measures taken to
improve the functioning of the CRO (_G/RO/W/217
and _G/RO/W/224).
In 2024, the Secretariat reported that all measures had been implemented and
made presentations specifically on the functioning of e-Registration; eAgenda;
"Introduction to the Committee on Rules of Origin" (resources for new
delegates in the Webpage); and the Rules of Origin Gateway (WTO Rules of Origin
Webpage).
12.2 Preferential rules of origin for Least Developed Countries (LDCs)
12.2. Members continued to engage in the implementation of
the 2013 and 2015 Ministerial Decisions (_WT/L/917 and _WT/L/917/Add.1 respectively) and of the 2022
Committee Decision on preferential rules of origin for LDCs (_G/RO/95). The Committee also considered possible next
steps to its 2023 report to the General Council (_G/RO/99) and agreed to follow a programme of work
covering different issues (_ICN/RO/7).
12.3. A
separate report contains a detailed account to the Committee's work in this
area (_G/RO/W/231/Rev.1)
13 Report
to the Council for Trade in Goods
13.1. The annual report to the Council for Trade in Goods is contained in
document (_G/RO/W/232/Rev.1).
_______________