At the invitation of the China Institute for WTO Studies, UIBE, and the law school of UIBE, Counselor Tang Xiaobing of the Market Access Division of WTO visited our college on April 16, 2014 and did a special report on “Post Bali and China”. The vice president Tu Xinquan, Prof. Li Yang, Prof. Liu Bin, Prof.Sun Na, Prof. Dai Zhen,  as well as  the  postgraduates and  doctoral students of the China Institute for WTO and the law school attended the lecture.

 

Counselor Tang is an alumni of UIBE, worked in the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation (now the Ministry of Commerce) from December, 1978 to March, 1986. He made the negotiations on behalf of China about joining the Multiple Fiber Agreement hosted by GATT and participated in the early preparations of the China’s entry into the WTO. From March, 1986 to October, 1987, he engaged in the work in relation to the trade policy and multilateral trade in the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development as the international textile trade expert. Later he was appointed the ITCB economic affairs officer. From November, 1987 to July, 2002 he was engaged in the trade policy, trade law and multilateral trade negotiations at the United National Conference on Trade and Development of international goods and service trade department. Since January, 2008, he works in the Market Access Division of WTO and the work content includes: non-agriculture market access, trade facilitation and market access issues about information technology products and other goods trade .

 

With the “Post Bali and China” as the theme, Councelor Tang talked about Chinese export situation before accesion to WTO and Chinese dynamic development process during the decade of accession to WTO. He made comparative analysis about the change process of the export of agriculture, manufacturing and the information industry in developing countries and developed countries and showed us the great export potential in developing countries.

 

Then, with the “NAMA Negotiation”, he explained to us the development of non-agricultural products market access problems, thus raised the tariff calculation problem.Councelor Tang said that, in China, the purpose of tariff concession is to reduce the high tariffs, and the tariff adjustment in our country is different for different member countries. He encouraged the postgraduates to combine applied mathematics with tariff calculation to serve China’s foreign trade and it will contribute to maximizing China’s own rights and interests in multilateral trade.

 

At the end, some students asked that what kind of knowledge could be useful for Chinese foreign trade in WTO. “It’s critical to apply what you’ve learned into practice, understand China’s trade policies and the rules of WTO and make China’s trade policies able to make use of  WTO’s rules for the welfare of China’s foreign trade.”, Councelor Tang responded meaningfully.

 

This report made students understand the status of China in the multilateral trade, explained the importance of tariffs’ making. The students benefited a lot form it.                                                                                  (By Tian Mo)