What next for plurilateral trade agreements?

Trade rules are out of step with commercial reality

Businesses need trade rules that are predictable, enforceable and capable of keeping pace with economic change. But the World Trade Organization (WTO) rulebook has not kept pace with today’s global economy. Companies now face a growing patchwork of unilateral measures, divergent regulatory requirements and ad hoc workarounds that raise costs and fragment global trade.

Plurilateral agreements are a practical way forward

Plurilateral agreements have been part of the WTO and, before it, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) throughout their history. They have delivered some of the multilateral trading system’s most commercially significant outcomes and remain an essential tool for developing new trade rules.
This policy paper examines:

• WTO and non-WTO approaches to plurilateral cooperation  
• Legal pathways available to integrate plurilateral outcomes into the WTO framework
• Practical design features needed to ensure agreements are durable, enforceable and commercially meaningful
• Near-term opportunities to deepen existing plurilateral agreements and advance new initiatives

Future initiatives need strong foundations to succeed

For plurilateral agreements to deliver real value they need more than agreed text. Success depends on clear implementation pathways from the outset of negotiations, credible enforcement, regular review, transparency, openness to wider participation and meaningful private-sector engagement. ICC recommends addressing concerns about developing-country participation through open accession and meaningful technical assistance.

Where future rulemaking should focus

The paper, What next for plurilateral trade agreements?, sets out a forward-looking agenda for the next generation of WTO plurilateral initiatives. It identifies opportunities to deepen existing agreements, which include a second-phase e-commerce agreement covering AI in commerce and data flows; a further expansion of the WTO Information Technology Agreement to cover post-2015 technology products; and a “TFA 2.0” building on the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement and focused on digital trade documents.

Download What next for plurilateral trade agreements? to explore ICC’s agenda for expanding and strengthening plurilateral agreements in the multilateral trading system.