The Russian Federation will become a member of the WTO no later than 220 days after December 16th. A large set of documents entitled "Conditions of Russia's Assession to the WTO" will be sent for approval by the ministerial commission of the WTO, which will meet in Geneva from December 15th to 17th. The "Russian" issue is preliminary scheduled for December 16. The director of the Negotiations Department at the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia, Maxim Medvedkov, spoke about it one month ahead of this date.
The WTO was founded in 1995. It includes 153 states, 97% of the world turnover belong to them. The process of accession of Russia to the WTO took 18 years. On November 9th, after long negotiations, Russia and Georgia signed the agreement on conditions of Russia’s accession to the WTO.
Recently the last formal meeting of the working group on Russia's accession to the WTO was held, where the documents for accession were approved: the report of the working group on Russia's assession to the WTO and the obligations of the Russian Federation on the access of goods to the market. All these documents will constitute a large set of documents entitled "Conditions of Russia's Assession to the WTO."
The report of the working group on Russia's assession to the WTO, which includes an overview of the trade policies of Russia and the Customs Union regarding the questions which are in the competence of the World Trade Organization and contain Russia's obligations concerning the so-called "systematic issues", talking about how Russia is going to meet the main WTO regulations.
Maxim Medvedkov hopes that the 153 ministers of the member-states of the WTO will approve this set of documents and the Russian Federation will become a member of the WTO no later than 220 days after November 16th. This period will be marked by procedures necessary for the ratification of this agreement. All the documents will be reviewed and approved by our parliament.
He said that Russia is not the record-holder on the length of negotiations on assession to the WTO. The champion is Algeria. It has been trying to join the WTO since 1987 and this process has not yet been completed.
The protective duty on Russian automobile production is about 20 %, while the protective duty on Russian railway production is only 9 %. Medvedkov said that concerning the foreign certification, this is not true. Russia has initiated the negotiations based on existing tariff rates. Tariffs which are provided by Russian obligations are equal or lower than the existing ones. But initially they were lower than tariffs used for cars. The decrease in percentage of tariffs on railway production is significantly less.
At the moment Belarus and Kazakhstan, Russia’s partners in the Customs Union, are holding negotiations on accession to the WTO. There are also Azerbaijan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – Russia’s CIS partners. When Russia joins the WTO it will undoubtedly take part in the work of working groups on assession to the WTO regarding Belarus and Kazakhstan especially, Medvedkov said.
According to Medvedkov, there will be no observers at the border, because this agreement provides for two conditions. Firstly, control over the movement of goods will be performed by customs as before, but a private company will be hired which will help the customs services to perform the controls and check the data on trade which will be sent to the WTO. This company will be established with the help of Switzerland. Russia and Georgia have managed to reach a not bad compromise regarding this agreement. This agreement in no way changes Russia’s principal position on South Ossetia and Abkhazia and in no way alters the sovereignty of these states.
VK
