Abstract:
Ethiopia submitted its formal request for accession WTO in January 2003. So far working party was
established and four meetings are conducted, but the progress of the legislative, institutional and
policy frameworks are very slow or do not exist in specific cases of private actors role in the process.
The National Committee entrusted with negotiating the accession process is neither inclusive of
private actors nor transparent about its obligations. The committee lacks members from the private
actors, namely the business community, private sector, and CSOs that represents real concerns of the
private sector. WTO accession under this context affects the offensive and defensive interest of
private sector which in turn hurts the country’s economy With the objective examining hoe to
enhance the role of private actors in the Ethiopia’s WTO accession, the research tries to deal with
this issue based on qualitative policy analysis using of the already existing documents and other
reference material to collect relevant data that can likely be used in the research. The finding of the
research from a comparative analysis of the existing private sector policies and accession activities
vis‐à‐vis the principles and practices of WTO suggests that there are different policies in the private
sector systems that are incompatible with the requirements of the GATT, GATS, and the practices in
trade negotiations. Accession process to WTO and undertaking any commitment require the
existence of inclusive and transparent National Committee and strong regulatory organs. Finally
recommendations for amendments and revisions are made on policy areas governing the private
actors role in the accession process and on the composition of National Committee. Consultation on
every accession steps, including worker party meetings, with representatives of all private actors is
recommended. It is also highly recommendable to make sure that the private actors are accessing the
newly established WTO Resource Center to enhance transparency problems
