GATS and Water

The document analyzes the legal tensions between GATS trade liberalization and the regulation of water services, which are often natural monopolies. It examines how different WTO Members use 'specific commitments' to carve out public utilities and preserve the ability to impose universal service obligations and subsidies. The authors argue that the ambiguity of GATS terms and the political pressure on developing countries may lead to a loss of regulatory autonomy over essential water services.

• Water services are typically natural monopolies where the State historically manages the resource, provides the service, and regulates quality and pricing. Modern trends include incorporating ecologically sustainable development (ESD) and increasing privatization or corporatization to improve efficiency.
• Civil society expresses three primary concerns regarding GATS and water: that the agreement mandates or 'locks in' privatization, that it limits the ability to impose universal service obligations (providing services to non-commercial areas or at below-cost), and that it restricts the use of subsidies for public providers.
• WTO Members use various methods to limit the scope of their GATS commitments in environmental services to preserve regulatory space. These include horizontal limitations for the whole schedule (European Communities), sector-specific limitations (Norway), or clarifications within the sector description (Sweden, Bulgaria, Switzerland).
• The US and Estonia limit the scope of their environmental services commitments by specifying they apply to services "contracted by private industry," which may be interpreted as limiting either the provider or the consumer to the private sector.
• The European Union's approach to public utilities allows for the maintenance of public monopolies or the granting of exclusive rights to private operators, provided these are subject to "specific service obligations," which likely include universal service obligations.
• The Nordic and Swiss approach to preserving regulatory freedom is broader than the EU's, as it explicitly excludes the "public works function" from commitments regardless of whether the service is owned, operated, or contracted out by the government.
• Increasing private sector participation through contracting-out or equity investment can inadvertently expand the scope of a country's GATS commitments, potentially stripping the government of the right to regulate those services under 'public service' exclusions.
• Developing countries are particularly vulnerable to these legal shifts because privatization is often a conditionality of World Bank or IMF financial arrangements rather than an autonomous policy choice.
• To preserve the ability to subsidize water for the poor, some Members (e.g., Bulgaria, Slovenia, and the EU) include horizontal limitations stating that the supply or subsidization of a service within the public sector does not breach their commitments.

APA

Speed, R., & Tuerk, E. (2003). GATS and Water. Center for International Environmental Law. https://www.ciel.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/GATSandWater_Draft_3Mar03.pdf

Chicago

Speed, Robert, and Elisabeth Tuerk. GATS and Water. Center for International Environmental Law, 2003. https://www.ciel.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/GATSandWater_Draft_3Mar03.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Speed |first1=Robert |last2=Tuerk |first2=Elisabeth |title=GATS and Water |publisher=Center for International Environmental Law |date=February 2003 |url=https://www.ciel.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/GATSandWater_Draft_3Mar03.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{speed2003gats, author = {Speed, Robert and Tuerk, Elisabeth}, title = {{GATS and Water}}, institution = {Center for International Environmental Law}, year = {2003}, month = feb, url = {https://www.ciel.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/GATSandWater_Draft_3Mar03.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }