The General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) was a multilateral agreement regulating international trade. According to its preamble, its purpose was the "substantial reduction of tariffs and other trade barriers and the elimination of preferences, on a reciprocal and mutually advantageous basis." It was negotiated during the UN Conference on Trade and Employment and was the outcome of the failure of negotiating governments to create the International Trade Organization (ITO). GATT was signed in 1948 and lasted until 1993, when it was replaced by the World Trade Organization in 1995.
The original GATT text (GATT 1958) is still in effect under the WTO framework, subject to the modifications of GATT 1994.
Read more about General Agreement On Tariffs And Trade: Rounds, GATT and The World Trade Organization
Famous quotes containing the words general, agreement and/or trade:
“Towards him they bend
With awful reverence prone; and as a God
Extoll him equal to the highest in Heav’n:
Nor fail’d they to express how much they prais’d,
That for the general safety he despis’d
His own: for neither do the Spirits damn’d
Loose all thir vertue; lest bad men should boast
Thir specious deeds on earth, which glory excites,
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—John Milton (1608–1674)
“Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose.”
—Bible: New Testament, 1 Corinthians 1:10.
“We are the trade union for pensioners and children, the trade union for the disabled and the sick ... the trade union for the nation as a whole.”
—Edward Heath (b. 1916)