Translated material
Eternal priority
In 2007, Russia again failed to become a member of the WTO
“Joining the World Trade Organization remains a priority of our foreign economic policy,” said the new Minister of Economic Development and Trade, Elvira Nabiullina, summing up the results of the year. True, lately there has increasingly been a feeling that this process will last forever . Negotiations have been going on for 13 years, and no one can predict when they will end.Over the past five years, specific deadlines for our accession have been repeatedly voiced at various levels, not only from the Russian side, but also from major WTO players. Nevertheless, the long-awaited opening of the door to Russia never happened. Russia has almost become a world leader in terms of the duration of the negotiation process. Negotiations took longer only with China - it took it 14 years to join the international trading club.
Ms. Nabiullina's predecessor, German Gref, said at the beginning of the year that it was critically important for Russia to join the WTO before the end of 2007. “This is important for our internal political calendar,” he explained. “Parliamentary elections will be held in Russia this December, and presidential elections next year.” According to the minister, Russia should enter the next political cycle as a member of the WTO.
Moreover, the federal budget for 2008-2010 is calculated on the basis that Russia will become a member of the WTO from January 1 next year, German Gref said last winter. According to government calculations, direct lost budget revenues from joining the WTO in 2008 will amount to about 40 billion rubles, in 2009 - approximately 70 billion rubles, in 2010 - 100 billion rubles. The budget will not receive this money through a gradual reduction and subsequent abolition of import tariffs.
True, the head of the Russian negotiating delegation, Maxim Medvedkov ( pictured ), is still quite optimistic. “There are no longer any serious obstacles to our country’s accession to the WTO. And only the inevitable accidents in such negotiations can hinder us,” he told Vremya Novostei yesterday. However, Mr. Medvedkov’s position is supposed to radiate optimism. Although he knows better than anyone how many deadlines have already been reached for the end of negotiations and how they were postponed year after year.
The funny thing about the situation is that Russia has already reached an agreement with the key players of the WTO. The protocol on the absence of disagreements with the European Union was signed in the spring of 2004, and with the United States in the fall of 2006. Currently, negotiations are not completed with only three countries - Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Georgia. But the difficulty is that any member of this organization, and there are more than 150 of them, can at any time announce their intention to begin negotiations. Russian negotiators also admit this. As Mr. Medvedkov told Interfax, “it is possible that new participants and new issues will appear on the negotiating platform. We are ready for this and, despite everything, we are working to complete the negotiation process in the coming months.” By the way, Saudi Arabia declared its interests only this summer, and the UAE generally entered into the negotiation process only two weeks ago.
In addition, in addition to bilateral negotiations, Russia still has to complete a multilateral round. The list of issues to be agreed upon is relatively small. But the problem is that many countries with which we managed to reach an agreement on a bilateral basis present their claims here. The most global problem in multilateral negotiations is agricultural issues. Russia is trying to fix the maximum permitted level of state support with a large margin. Currently, the level of state support for agriculture is $3.2 billion. But Russia in negotiations is trying to ensure that the maximum possible level of support reaches $9 billion. However, there is no agreement on this issue among the WTO members themselves.
Other controversial issues at multilateral negotiations include the protection of intellectual property, sanitary and phytosanitary standards. In addition, WTO members have complaints about customs regulation, in particular about the activities of pre-shipment inspections. Another stumbling block is the special position in the economy of the largest state-owned companies, such as Gazprom or Rosneft. Their activities are not prohibited by WTO rules, but according to the rules of this club they must be carried out in an equal competitive environment. Our negotiators have not yet been able to prove that Russian “monsters” work according to all the canons of a market economy.