The Indian delegation at WTO has submitted revised offer in August 2005 in the ongoing negotiations under GATS.
General Agreement on Trade in
Services (GATS)
The Indian
delegation at WTO has submitted revised offer in August 2005 in the ongoing
negotiations under GATS.
The offers were
initially made in the Doha Round in sectors/sub-sectors covered in the
commitments made in Uruguay Round. The seven sectors of services covered were-
(i) Health related
and social services
(ii) Tourism and
travel related services
(iii) Communication services
(iv) Financial services
(v) Business services
(vi) Construction
& related engineering services and
(vii) Transport
services
The revised offer
includes four other sectors which were not covered earlier. These services are
-
·
Distribution services
·
Education services
·
Environmental services and
·
Cultural, sporting and recreational services.
GATS
provides for four modes of supply of services.
Mode
1 - Cross-border supply
Mode
2 - Consumption abroad
Mode
3 - Commercial presence
Mode
4 - Presence / movement of natural persons
India
and many other developing countries in Modes I and 4. The Mode 4 interest is
due to the presence of a large skilled and competitive workforce. It will
enable India to take advantage of Mode 1 due to core competence is Information
Technology related services.
India
had already made a substantial Mode 4 initial offer by including all categories
of natural per~ons including
independent professionals.
The sector of
Business Services cover medical and dental services, services provided by
nurses, midwives, pharmacists, physiotherapists and other paramedical services
are included. The Section 3 offered includes higher education services.
India spends only
0.9 percent of its GDP on health care in public sector forcing the majority of
the people to turn to private health systems that are often beyond their reach.
The Indian Government has recognized health as an inalienable human right that
every individual can claim. So long as wide health inequalities exist in our
country and access to essential health care is not universally assured, it is
feared that we would fall short in both economic planning and in our moral
obligations to all citizens.
The
developments in post-WTO era related to new patent regime and GATS should be
accepted as challenges and converted in to opportunities to further strengthen
our infrastructure of pharmaceutical industries and their R&D set-up and
also global exploitation and utilization of our professional services and
skills.
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