· The European Union along with a few other developed countries have
proposed that water be included as an environmental service under the
General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). This proposal, if accepted,
means that all signatories to GATS will have to comply to "the reduction or
as appropriate, elimination of tariff and non-tariff barriers to environmental goods and services."
· A recently leaked document on the European Commissions' secret "WTO
negotiating positions" shows a wish list of 29 countries including China, India, Egypt and Mexico, amongst others, where they would like the opening
up of service sectors in everything from water supplies to banking.
Water in developing countries is a major target for European water ompanies in the current negotiations. Many of them are lobbying their governments for partnership initiatives in the context of the WSSD processes. One of the arguments used to deflect criticisms of GATS is that developing countries have the choice to "opt in" the services they want to be liberalised, making exemptions for those they wish to build up domestically. While that may be true, what the document shows is that the commission has simply taken this list of exemptions and has used it to base its liberalisation hit list.
proposed that water be included as an environmental service under the
General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). This proposal, if accepted,
means that all signatories to GATS will have to comply to "the reduction or
as appropriate, elimination of tariff and non-tariff barriers to environmental goods and services."
· A recently leaked document on the European Commissions' secret "WTO
negotiating positions" shows a wish list of 29 countries including China, India, Egypt and Mexico, amongst others, where they would like the opening
up of service sectors in everything from water supplies to banking.
Water in developing countries is a major target for European water ompanies in the current negotiations. Many of them are lobbying their governments for partnership initiatives in the context of the WSSD processes. One of the arguments used to deflect criticisms of GATS is that developing countries have the choice to "opt in" the services they want to be liberalised, making exemptions for those they wish to build up domestically. While that may be true, what the document shows is that the commission has simply taken this list of exemptions and has used it to base its liberalisation hit list.