Jordan Times
Sunday, November 28, 1999
Custom duties, investment in the services sector
given special consideration by WTO
By Mohammad Ben Hussein
AMMAN — Jordan has been given an adjusting period to cope with the implementation of two articles of the World Trade Organisation rules which are custom duties and investment in the services sector on the grounds that it is a developing country, a trade ministry official said on Saturday.
Minister of trade and industry left to the United States for ministerial talks for the formal announcement of Jordan's entry to the WTO.
"Jordan will be the only country whose entry into the WTO will be announced during the ministerial meeting in Seattle, Washington, next Tuesday," said Tamam Goul, head of the WTO department at the Ministry of Trade and Industry.
The first reduction of custom tariffs will start in 2005 over a period of 5 to 10 years, said Goul.
Allowing foreign firms to invest in the services sector will be in accordance with the Jordanian laws and legislation, she added.
She said that Jordan last week reached all necessary steps to reach its much-awaited entry into the world trade body.
Jordan will become the fifth Arab country to be a member of the WTO along with Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, once its membership is endorsed in Seattle.
Formal membership should become effective early next year, a target date which the government has been striving to meet.
Late last year Jordan embarked on a privatisation drive as part of an economic reforms package including legislation to protect copyrights and reduce customs and tariffs on some consumer goods aimed at gaining WTO membership.
At the end of October U.S. Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Stuart Eizenstat announced the appointment of a U.S. debt advisor to the finance ministry.
A four-day WTO ministerial conference opens in Seattle on Tuesday to chart an agenda for a new round of multilateral trade liberalisation talks in 2000.