The Challenges and Opportunities of E-Commerce.(Brief Article)

At the World Trade Organization (WTO) we, like everyone else, are facing up to the huge opportunities and challenges that the electronic-commerce revolution brings. Although the WTO is increasingly involved with e-commerce, our responsibility for it is limited and specialized. We are not in the business of regulating the Internet, and we never shall be. The huge potential of e-commerce may be yet stifled by over-regulation and interference by governments. But if that happens, it will be despite, not because of, the WTO.

The WTO system is a series of agreements between governments. It involves a set of rules, freely negotiated and accepted by a consensus of our member governments, which limit governments' ability to interfere with trade. These rules apply to trade in e-commerce as they do to other forms of trade. The disciplines that already exist in the WTO system aim to facilitate electronic trade, and that would also be the purpose of any new disciplines that might be negotiated at the WTO.

The work program on e-commerce now in progress at the WTO aims to provide the answers to three questions. First, how do existing WTO agreements impact e-commerce? Second, are there any weaknesses or omissions in the law which need to be remedied? And third, are there any new issues not now covered by the WTO system on which members want to negotiate new disciplines?

Among the existing WTO agreements the most relevant to e-commerce is the GATS, the agreement on trade in services, because it contains the disciplines which guarantee the right to do international business electronically. As far as international trade is concerned, e-commerce essentially means two things. First, it is an important channel for retailing and wholesaling goods and services. Also, rights to provide retail and wholesale distribution are covered by the GATS. Second, and probably more important, e-commerce is the delivery of services direct to the consumer in the form of digitized information. The GATS covers the delivery of services by any means, including electronic means. It is obvious that commitments to allow the supply of a service which did not guarantee the ability to supply it electronically would be largely meaningless.

There is a debate about whether some products, even in electronic form, should rather be classified and treated as goods. The point here is that if governments can agree that some digitized products--computer software, for example--should be classified as goods and that GATT rather than GATS obligations should apply to them, that is fine. But that must not be allowed to create doubt as to whether the electronic delivery of services is covered by GATS. Services are already supplied electronically in vast quantities. The only legal guarantees that such supply will continue to be permitted are in the market-access commitments WTO members have made under the GATS.

Our work program is tightly focused and strictly related to trade. We are considering the application of all our disciplines--GATT, GATS and TRIPS, the intellectual property agreement, in ...