ISLAMABAD, March 1: Pakistan along with other 13 developing countries has submitted new market access requests in three modes of services as part of Doha Development Agenda (DDA) negotiations in services.

Officials told Dawn on Wednesday that these joint requests mark the beginning of the plurilateral negotiations in services — means collective requests — agreed by WTO members at last WTO ministerial meeting in Hong Kong.

The deadline for submission of plurilateral requests was Feb 28. These requests were expected to be discussed during the next services cluster of meetings scheduled from March 27 to April 7, 2006 in Geneva.

Pakistan, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Dominican Republic, Egypt, Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Peru, Thailand were agreeable to present collective requests in mode 4 (movement of natural persons).

The plurilateral request means that the member countries would also offer market access to other countries in these sectors in which they have made request for market access from others.

These member countries agreed to include Contractual Service Suppliers and Independent Providers in mode 4 and to be de-linked from mode 3 (commercial presence/ foreign direct investment). The target group of countries for these requests includes US, EU, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, Iceland. While Korea, Singapore, Hong Kong China, Chinese Taipei could also be added.

Under CSS requests made in architectural services, urban planning and landscape architectural services, engineering services, integrated engineering services, technical testing & analysis services, environmental services, management consulting services, services related to management consulting, maintenance and repair of equipment (not including maritime vessels, aircraft or other transport equipment), accounting & bookkeeping, medical & dental services, research and development services, computer and related services, construction and related engineering services, travel agency and tour operator services, tourist guide services, hotels and restaurants.

Under the IPs the member made requests in architectural services, urban planning and landscape architectural services, engineering services, integrated engineering services, technical testing & analysis services, environmental services, management consulting services, services related to management consulting, accounting & bookkeeping, research and development services, computer & related services, travel agency and tour operator services.