Ministers from WTO member-countries decided at the 1996 Singapore ministerial conference to set up three new working groups: on trade and investment, on competition policy, and on transparency in government procurement. They also instructed the WTO Goods Council to look at possible ways of simplifying trade procedures, an issue sometimes known as "trade facilitiation". Work in the WTO on investment and competition policy issues so far has largely taken the form of specific responses to specific trade policy issues, rather than a look at the broad picture. New decisions reached at the 1996 ministerial conference in Singapore change the perspective. The ministers decided to set up two working groups to look more generally at the relationships between trade, on the one hand, and investment and competition policies, on the other.
The working groups' tasks are analytical and exploratory. They will not negotiate new rules or commitments. The ministers made clear that no decision has been reached on whether there will be negotiations in the future, and that any discussions cannot develop into negotiations without a clear consensus decision. Both working groups must report to the General Council which will decide at the ed of 1998 what should happen next. The ministers also recognized the work underway in the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and other international organizations. The working groups are to cooperate with these organizations so as to make best use of available resources and to ensure that development issues are fully taken into account. An indication of how closely trade is linked with investment is the fact that about one third of the $6.1 trillion total for world trade in goods and services in 1995 was trade within companies . For example between subsidiaries in different countries or between a subsidiary and its headquarters. The close relationships between trade and investment and competition policy have long been recognized. One of the intentions, when GATT was drafted in the late 1940s, was for rules on investment and competition policy to exist alongside those for trade in goods. (The other two agreements were not completed because the attempt to create an International Trade Organization failed.) Over the years, GATT and the WTO have increasingly dealt with specific aspects of the relationships. For example, one type of trade covered by the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) is the supply of services by a foreign company setting up operations in a host country  i.e. through foreign investment. The Trade-Related Investment Measures Agreement says investors' right to use imported goods as inputs should not depend on their export performance. The same goes for competition policy. GATT and GATS contain rules on monoplies and exclusive service suppliers. The principles have been elaborated considerably in the rules and commitments on telecommunications. The agreements on intellectual property and services both recognize governments' rights to act against anti-competitive practices, and their rights to work together to limit these practices. Transparency in government purchases: towards multilateral rules  back to top. The WTO already has an Agreement on Government Procurement. It is plurilateral , only some WTO members have signed it so far. The agreement covers such issues as transparency and non-discrimination.

