{"id":36152,"date":"2013-05-29T08:22:36","date_gmt":"2013-05-29T12:22:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/?p=36152"},"modified":"2013-05-29T08:22:36","modified_gmt":"2013-05-29T12:22:36","slug":"trade-commissions-major-wto-paper","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/2013\/05\/trade-commissions-major-wto-paper","title":{"rendered":"Trade Commission’s ‘Major’ WTO Paper"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The Trade Commission will submit a \u201ccomprehensive paper\u201d on the positions the Bahamas should take over World Trade Organisation (WTO) accession before end-June, its chairman said.<\/p>\n

Speaking as the Commission and Ministry of Financial Services embarked on a major round of WTO-related consultation with the private sector, Philip Galanis told Tribune Business that such meetings were \u201ccritically important if we\u2019re going to be effective\u201d.<\/p>\n

Noting that major reforms to the Bahamian business and commercial landscape would soon be implemented in \u201crapid succession\u201d, Mr Galanis suggested it was \u201cnot coincidental\u201d that Value-Added Tax (VAT) would be introduced just prior to completing accession to full WTO membership.<\/p>\n

And Ryan Pinder, minister of financial services, yesterday told Tribune Business that the consultations were designed to aid revisions to the Bahamas\u2019 goods and services offers prior to this nation\u2019s third meeting with the \u2018Working Party\u2019 that is determining the terms of its WTO accession.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Mr Galanis, a former PLP MP and Senator, said the Trade Commission had no choice but to be \u201cactive\u201d if the Bahamas – and its private sector – were to negotiate the best possible WTO accession terms, and thus maximise trade benefits.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe intend at the Trade Commission to submit a fairly comprehensive paper to the Government on trade matters before the end of June,\u201d the well-known accountant told Tribune Business.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat will cover a number of positions we would like to see the Government take into account with WTO. We\u2019re still drafting it. It\u2019s really a multi-pronged approach.\u201d<\/p>\n

While the Trade Commission itself met monthly, Mr Galanis said its sub-committees had been particularly active in obtaining input and feedback from various industries and businesses.<\/p>\n

The Commission has sub-committees focused on areas such as investments, agriculture and fisheries, financial services and manufacturing, and Mr Galanis said: \u201cWe\u2019ve made every effort to ensure they [the private sector] provide input to us.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s critically important. We hope to inform the Government on a number of issues critical to the private sector.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe see this kind of public focus as important in obtaining input from the private sector. Some have fallen through the cracks, perhaps, in the past while others have not, and we want as much public discussion on this as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n

By Neil Hartnell<\/span><\/em>
\nTribune Business Editor<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

Original News Article<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Trade Commission will submit a \u201ccomprehensive paper\u201d on the positions the Bahamas should take over World Trade Organisation (WTO) accession before end-June, its chairman said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_10223285771444175_51037792744":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1713,1010],"class_list":["post-36152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business","tag-trade-commission","tag-wto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36152","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36152"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36152\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bahamasb2b.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}