Special and Differential Treatment Issues
The WTO Agreement contains provisions which give developing countries special rights. These are called “special and differential treatment” (S&D) provisions.
Under existing S&D provisions, WTO Members provide developing country Members with technical assistance and transitional arrangements toward implementation of the WTO Agreement. S&D provisions also enable Members to provide developing country Members with better-than-MFN access to markets.
The Special Session of the Committee on Trade and Development (CTD-SS) was established by the Trade Negotiations Committee (TNC) in February 2002, to fulfill the Doha Declaration mandate to review all special and differential treatment provisions “with a view to strengthening them and making them more precise, effective and operational.”
Additional information on WTO work related to S&D can be accessed through the WTO website.
Documents related to the work of the CTD-SS can be accessed through the WTO “Documents Online” website:
Reports by the Chairman of the CTD-SS to the Trade Negotiations Committee can be obtained by searching under the Document Code TN/CTD/%, and keyword “report”.
Minutes on CTD-SS meetings can be obtained by searching under the Document Code TN/CTD/M/% (where % takes additional values).
Working documents on the CTD-SS can be obtained by searching under the Document Code TN/CTD/W/% (where % takes additional values).
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