ABSTRACT
That a General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) was secured in the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade negotiations was a major achievement. There was considerable opposition from several key developing countries to including services trade in these negotiations at all. Agreement to include them was secured only by having the services negotiations on a different track from the GATT-based negotiations, with the negotiations strictly not being between contracting parties to the GATT, but between trade ministers representing their governments. The negotiations were serviced by the GATT Secretariat following GATT procedures and practices. The distinction between the two tracks became blurred over time, particularly after the midterm review (Croome 1995).
