Preferential Trade Agreements and Trade Liberalization Efforts in the OIC Member States

With Special Emphasis on the TPS-OIC

The dates of ratifications or entry into force of agreements can be treated as broadly indicating

the time when the agreements might have started being implemented. The distribution

The analysis refers to an RTA defined geographically. Where there is more than one

overlapping agreement (e.g. separately concerning goods and services) between a given

groups of countries, this is counted as one. For instance, South Asian Free Trade Agreement

(SAFTA) and SAARC Agreement on Trade in Services (SATIS) is counted as one of these dates

over time is similar to the signature dates. A certain number of agreements has not yet been

ratified or entered into force (or this information was not available in the consulted sources).

Of the analysed agreements, 101 are believed to have been actually implemented in that

certain trade liberalisation steps have actually taken place. However, it should be noted that

this category is broadly defined and may imply very different levels of progress in the

liberalisation of trade relations between participating countries. This is due to the large

heterogeneity of the agreements themselves and their level of ambition and length of the

implementation period originally foreseen and/or actually followed. On average an OIC

member country is currently party to four RTAs with the number of such agreements ranging

from 1 in the case of Yemen, Tajikistan, Chad or Gabon to 21 in the case of Turkey.

Six

countries (Turkey, Malaysia, Jordan, Pakistan, Egypt, and Indonesia) have more than 10

agreements in place. Figure 5 provides a distribution of the number of agreements that OIC

members participate in. It shows that 26 OIC countries have between four and six

implemented RTAs and 18 counties have between one and three RTAs.

Figure 5:

Distribution of the Number of OIC Countries by RTA Membership

Source: WTO

The analysis refers to an RTA defined geographically. Where there is more than one overlapping agreement

(e.g. separately concerning goods and services) between a given group of countries, this is counted as one. For

instance, South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) and SAARC Agreement on Trade in Services (SATIS) is

counted as one.

Four is both the median and mode value for the number of agreements per OIC member.