The World Trade Organization (WTO) is an important selective, mainly private, international organization designed by its founders to supervise and liberalize international trade. The organization officially commenced on 1 January 1995, under the Marrakesh Agreement, succeeding the 1947 General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT).

The World Trade Organization deals with regulation of trade between participating countries; it provides a framework for negotiating and formalising trade agreements, and a dispute resolution process aimed at enforcing participants' adherence to WTO agreements which are signed by representatives of member governments and ratified by their parliaments.Understanding the WTO - what is the World Trade Organization?, World Trade Organization Most of the issues that the WTO focuses on derive from previous trade negotiations, especially from the Uruguay Round (1986-1994). The organization is currently endeavouring to persist with a trade negotiation called the Doha Development Agenda (or Doha Round), which was launched in 2001 to enhance equitable participation of poorer countries which represent a majority of the world's population. However, the negotiation has been dogged by "disagreement between exporters of agricultural bulk commodities and countries with large numbers of subsistence farmers on the precise terms of a 'special safeguard measure' to protect farmers from surges in imports. At this time, the future of the Doha Round is uncertain."

The WTO has 153 members, representing more than 95% of total world trade and 30 observers, most seeking membership. The WTO is governed by a ministerial conference, meeting every two years; a general council, which implements the conference's policy decisions and is responsible for day-to-day administration; and a director-general, who is appointed by the ministerial conference. The WTO's headquarters is at the Centre William Rappard, Geneva, Switzerland.

ITO and GATT 1947

In the absence of an international organization for trade, the GATT would over the years "transform itself" into a de facto international organization.It was contemplated that the GATT would be applied for several years until the ITO came into force. However, since the ITO was never brought into being, the GATT gradually became the focus for international governmental cooperation on trade matters (P. van den Bossche, The Law and Policy of the World Trade Organization, 81; J.H. Jackson, Managing the Trading System, 134).

GATT rounds of negotiations

The GATT was the only multilateral instrument governing international trade from 1948 until the WTO was established in 1995.The GATT Years: from Havana to Marrakesh, World Trade Organization Despite attempts in the mid 1950s and 1960s to create some form of institutional mechanism for international trade, the GATT continued to operate for almost half a century as a semi-institutionalized multilateral treaty regime on a provisional basis.M.E. Footer, Analysis of the World Trade Organization, 17