OneWorld.net (U.S.)

The issue of services was on the board for long in the international trading system. The constitution of General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) to some extent provided the necessary impetus to regularize the service sector and it was also envisaged that gradually with further developments, list of services would be broadened. The latest in the series is environmental services. The Doha Ministerial Declaration of 2001 opened the pandora box by stating in its Article 31 (iii) to reduce the tariff or bring the tariff rate to zero on the environmental goods and services. However, DMD did not explicitly define what are environmental goods and services. The whole process was put in lurch due to lack of definition and still the negotiation is undergoing to define the environmental goods and services. Some deadlines were drawn during the Doha round but all the deadlines have been miserably failed.

The paper is an attempt to highlight the past and current negotiations on the environmental services. The paper would also highlight what has led to deadlock on the subject. It would also highlight the concerns of the developing countries.