Group on Services - Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation

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The services sector generates significant economic growth, trade and investment in the Asia-Pacific region. This sector is also a significant employer of people in the region. To encourage further growth and development in this sector, APEC's Group on Services (GOS) works on trade and investment liberalisation and facilitation issues related to trade in services, and coordinates APEC's work in this area. GOS works in close collaboration with four service-related Working Groups: Telecommunications and Information; Transportation; Tourism; and Energy.

The Group on Services (GOS) was established by the CTI as a subgroup in 1997 to address the TILF tasks in the area of services as mandated in the Osaka Action Agenda and instructed by Leaders, Ministers, SOM and CTI.

Achievements

GOS finished its multi-year project of the Menu of Options which had been implemented through three phases since 2000. The Menu of Options contains a comprehensive list of measures APEC members could undertake to liberalize trade in services and promote economic and technical cooperation among members. Other recent GOS activities include:

Workshop on WTO Rules Negotiations of Trade in Services (2006). The workshop covered topics of WTO rules negotiations including domestic regulations, subsidies, government procurement and emergency safeguard measures and contributed to the members' understanding and their better participation in the WTO rules-making process.
Symposium on Transparency of Mode 4 Commitments (2005). Bringing together trade policy and immigration experts to discuss ways in which member economies could increase the transparency, and thereby the usefulness, of their existing and future GATS Mode 4 commitments, the symposium introduced a common template usable by members that provided additional information relating to their GATS Mode 4 commitments. Mode 4 is defined in GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services) as the supply of a service by a service supplier of one member, through presence of natural persons of a member in the territory of any other member.
Symposium on Mutual Recognition Agreements (2005). Participants shared experiences regarding requirements for the supply of professional services by foreigners and mutual recognition agreements on professional services.
APEC Seminar on Scheduling of Commitments under the GATS (2005) Participants gained a better understanding on scheduling of commitments under GATS, which enable their economies to take part more effectively in the ongoing WTO services negotiations. At the seminar, participants were briefed on the basic concepts, scope and coverage of GATS, the latest development of the initial and revised services offers by WTO members.

Current Activities

Support for the Multilateral Trading System

At recent GOS meetings held in February, May and September 2006, members explored ways to provide APEC inputs to the WTO negotiations on services by exchanging relevant information on the recent WTO developments.
GOS discussed concrete proposals in support of the ongoing negotiations, particularly those on the rule-making areas for Emergency Safeguard Measures (ESM).
GOS agreed to keep ESM on the agenda and will have more detailed and in-depth discussions at the meetings in 2007, which could be one of the Group's contributions to the WTO negotiations on services.
GOS was briefed on the outcomes of the APEC project "Workshop on WTO Rules Negotiations of Trade in Services" held in June 2006 in Kunming, China. The workshop covered topics such as domestic regulations, subsidies, government procurement and emergency safeguard measures.

Promotion of High-Quality RTAs/FTAs

At GOS meetings in May and September 2006, GOS reviewed a draft chapter on trade in services as part of the APEC model measures for RTAs/FTAs. GOS members will contribute to the CTI's work program on the model measures to provide their inputs for related services issues.
GOS will hold a joint workshop with the Investment Expert Group (IEG) on the Relationship between Investment and Trade in Services in RTAs/FTAs and other Investment Agreements in 2007.

GOS Collective Action Plan (CAP)

GOS reviewed its Collective Action Plan of 2005, and it will continue to update its action plan to reflect revised priorities and to ensure they are more outcome-oriented.
In line with the CTI instructions to ensure that Terms of References (TORs) of all sub-fora be reviewed in 2006, GOS adopted its new TOR at the meeting in September 2006.
The ongoing APEC project "Skill Standardization for Nursing Profession" aims to conduct research on skills standardization for the nursing profession and share experiences and expertise among APEC economies to explore ways in setting up the nursing skill standard in the region.