Development and Prospect of the CRTA in WTO system

RTAs represent both a challenge and an opportunity for the WTO system. Many issues are emerging regarding the linkages or the conflicts between RTAs and the WTO in different legal aspects. Furthermore, RTAs and the WTO rules have reciprocal influence on each other in various ways. Therefore, it is required to harmonise RTAs and WTO rules. The main objective of this paper is related to these issues. It researches the development of the Committee on Regional Trade Agreements (CRTA) and detects the problems of the RTAs regulations by the CRTA.

The inability of the CRTA of the WTO to come to decisions on whether RTAs satisfy Article XXIV of the GATT is a problem in the first place. In the absence of such determination, transparency is important, as this helps mobilise domestic and regional groups who are negatively affected by RTA policies. Although it is not perfect, the improvement of the Transparency Mechanism with Doha Round negotiations made important progress in multilateral surveillance of the WTO on RTAs.