WTO expands Information Technology Agreement

The World Trade Organization’s Information Technology Agreement was expanded last week to include additional tariff cuts on high-tech trade.    The World Trade Organization’s Information Technology Agreement was expanded last week to include additional tariff cuts on high-tech trade.
   “We are confident that all parties will now give formal approval to their participation in what would be the first tariff-elimination deal at the WTO in 18 years,” said Michael Froman, U.S. trade representative and a lead negotiator at the ITA discussions in Geneva.
   Since the ITA went into force in 1997, global trade covered by the agreement has more than tripled, increasing to more than $4 trillion in annual trade. Despite extensive advances in technology, however, the product scope of the agreement has never been expanded. More than 200 tariff lines will be reduced to zero under an expanded ITA. 
   Specifically, medical equipment, GPS devices, video game consoles, computer software and next generation semiconductors are among the high-tech products that will see tariff elimination. For example, under the expanded ITA agreement, tariffs on U.S.-made magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) machines for export, currently up to 8 percent, will be reduced to zero, while tariffs on printer ink cartridges manufactured in the United Sates, which can now reach up to 25 percent, will also be reduced to zero.
   For the United States, the expanded ITA agreement is expected to support an additional 60,000 jobs and eliminate tariffs on about $1 trillion in global sales of information and communications technologies of which more than $100 billion now come from the United States, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.