The WTO Agreement and Telecommunications Policy Reform
Every country serious about introducing competition finds that the transition from monopoly to competition is both economically rewarding and laden with policy dilemmas. As a new century begins, we have an essentially new market for telecommunicati...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Policy Research Working Paper |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2014
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2001/05/1121208/wto-agreement-telecommunications-policy-reform http://hdl.handle.net/10986/19661 |
| Summary: | Every country serious about introducing
competition finds that the transition from monopoly to
competition is both economically rewarding and laden with
policy dilemmas. As a new century begins, we have an
essentially new market for telecommunications. Digital
technology forced a re-examination of the opportunity costs
of protecting traditional telecommunications equipment and
service suppliers. An inefficient market for
telecommunications threatened competitiveness in the
computer, software, and information industry markets.
Meanwhile, after dislocations created by global stagflation
through the early 1980s, developing countries became
interested in privatization of state enterprises as a tool
of economic reform--and state telephone companies were
especially promising targets for privatization. Those
countries began exploring options for allowing selective
competition, as phone companies in major industrial
countries began looking to foreign markets for new business
opportunities. The World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreement
on Basic Telecommunications Services created a new regime
for the world market. Now we must pay close attention to
regulatory fundamentals: 1) Low barriers to entry in the
market for communications services. 2) Effective
re-balancing of rates for services during the market
transition. 3) Effective Strong interconnection policies. 4)
The creation of independent regulatory authorities with the
resources and power necessary to foster competition and
safeguard consumer welfare. The authors assess how
developing and transition economies have fared in profiting
from changes in the telecommunications market. They also
examine the policy challenges that remain, paying special
attention to the global market and regulatory milieu
fostered by the 1997 WTO Agreement. They ask what this
latest transformation has taught us about wise management of
this vital part of the world economy's infrastructure.
They focus on the economics of managing the transition to
competition, the design of proper regulatory policies and
processes, and the embedding of domestic telecommunications
in the world market. |
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