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Unit 8: World Trade Organization

United Kingdom, and the United States. 45,000 tariff concessions were made influencing over notes
$10 billion in trade which comprised 20% of the total global market at the time.

Gatt 1947 in the us
The GATT, as an international agreement, is similar to a treaty. Under United States law it is
classified as a congressional-executive agreement. Based on the Reciprocal Trade Agreements
Act it allowed the executive branch negotiating power over trade agreements with temporary
authority from Congress. At the time it functioned as a provisional, but promising trade system.
The agreement is based on the “unconditional most favoured nation principle.” This means that the
conditions applied to the most favoured trading nation (i.e. the one with the least restrictions)
apply to all trading nations. In the US, there was large opposition against the International Trade
Organization (which had been ratified in several countries, including Australia), and thus President
Truman never even submitted it to Congress. This caused other countries to lose interest and
left the orphaned GATT as the world’s only multilateral trade agreement, coming into force on
January 1, 1948.

Gatt 1949

The second round took place in 1949 in Annecy, France. The main focus of the talks was more
tariff reductions, around 5000 total.

Gatt 1951

The third round occurred in Torquay, England in 1951. 8,700 tariff concessions were made totaling
the remaining amount of tariffs to three-fourths of the tariffs which were in effect in 1948.
Gatt 1955-1956

The fourth round returned to Geneva in 1955 and lasted until May 1956. $2.5 billion in tariffs
were eliminated or reduced.

Gatt “Dillon” 1960-1962

The fifth round occurred once more in Geneva and lasted from 1960 to 1962. The talks were
named after Under Secretary of State General of the US, Douglas Dillon, who first proposed the
talks. Along with reducing over $4.9 billion in tariffs, it also yielded discussion relating to the
creation of the European Economic Community (EEC).

Gatt “kennedy” 1964-1967

The sixth round was the last to take place in Geneva from 1964 until 1967 and was named after
the late US President Kennedy in his memory. Concessions were made on $40 billion worth of
tariffs. Some of the GATT negotiation rules were also more clearly defined.

Gatt 1973-1979

The seventh round of GATT took place in Tokyo from 1973 until 1979. The talks managed to
reduce several trade barriers in addition to $300 billion in tariffs. Negotiations covered a range
of topics including government procurement, customs valuation, subsidies, countervailing
measures, antidumping, standards and import licensing.

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