The EU tabled its initial services offer on 29 April, two months after a 31 March WTO deadline. According to the negotiating mandate on services that Members agreed at Doha in 2001, "participants shall submit initial requests for specific commitments by 30 June 2002 and initial offers by 31 March 2003", and a limited number of offers have been trickling in before and after the deadline (see BRIDGES Weekly, 2 April 2003). The EU initial services offer reduces certain restrictions and expands market opportunities for foreign suppliers. It is presented in a conditional manner, subject to substantive offers of similar depth from other Members. The services sector is of fundamental importance for the EU, accounting for two third of its gross domestic product (GDP) and employment. The EU is also a world leader in various services sectors including telecoms, financial services, business and environmental services.

The EU offer has both horizontal and sectoral aspects. At the horizontal level, the EU offer modifies part of the EU general regime on investment, removing prior authorisation requirements in some member states, such as Portugal. Regarding real estate, some of the restrictions for acquiring and/or renting property are removed. Subsidies in the services sector are maintained, which some observers raised concerns over, questioning how useful the liberalisation commitments would be to developing country suppliers.

Sectoral commitments

At the sectoral level, the offer expands on existing EU commitments in a number of sectors, including telecom, financial services, transport, postal and courier services, computer services, environmental services, distribution, construction, tourism, new agencies and entertainment services. Various services sectors of a sensitive nature are excluded from the offer, including education, health, social services, and audiovisuals, in order to address civil society concerns and the interests of some regional authorities in Europe. Regarding public utilities, the EU offer does not change the current limitations favouring of public utilities within the EU.

Water for human use and wastewater management are also covered by the EU offer. In this regard, the Commission stressed that, "this sub sector only concerns the distribution of water through 'mains' and excludes any cross border transportation". Civil society groups, including Friends of the Earth Europe, WDM and the Center for International Environmental Law signalled disappointment, having opposed liberalisation of the water sector in general.

Temporary entry into the EU

While many developing countries had requested actual commitments in mode four (Temporary Entry of Foreign Nationals), the EU offer only introduces some superficial commitments under this mode. The EU has offered the following potential commitments:

*Corporate managers and specialists will be allowed to stay for an extended period of three years. Graduate corporate trainees will be allowed to stay a maximum period of 12 months. In either case, an economic needs test will not be required.

*Foreign companies with a contract to provide services to a client in the EU will be allowed to send highly skilled corporate employees to the EU for a maximum period of six months (within a period of 12 months). This period was previously limited to three months. The offer does not, however, apply to important services sectors such as research and development, construction, higher education and entertainment.

*A new category of contractual services in offered. Self-employed, highly skilled people will be allowed to enter the EU for up to six moths. This applies only to architectural, engineering and integrated engineering services, computer, management consulting and translation services. The entry of individual service suppliers is subject to a numerical ceiling, for which the modalities and level are still to be determined.

According to the civil society group GATS Watch, the "EU offer on mode four appears to be very poor. The possibility of concessions in mode four has been used by the EU and by businesses to sell the GATS negotiations to developing countries. The current EU offer shows that this is for the most part an empty promise". This can be detected in the lack of offers regarding less skilled labour, and in the lack of mention of "GATS-type" visas -- an idea presented by various developing countries to clearly differentiate temporary movement of persons form migration flows (which are not covered by the GATS), and as a way to facilitate the burdensome and sometimes ineffective normal visa procedures.

The EU offer and other WTO Members' offers can be found at: http://www.ictsd.org/issarea/services/index.htm.

ICTSD reporting; "WTO Services: EU proposes to improve trading opportunities giving developing countries a better deal, " EU DG TRADE PRESS RELEASE, 29 April 2003; "EU makes a detailed services proposal in the WTO," EU DG TRADE PRESS RELEASE, 30 April 2003; "European Commission releases 'provisional GATS offer', " GATSWATCH PRESS RELEASE, 1 May 2003.