New issue are the trade liberalisation issues which were brought by the developed countries after the final Uruguay Round or after signing the establishment of the WTO in1995. Since these new issues were raised during the first Ministerial Conference at Singapore, they are also called as Singapore issues.
The new issues are: investment, competition policy, government procurement and trade facilitation. The developed countries are always pressurising the developing countries to include the new issues in trade negotiations to broaden the agenda of the WTO.
At Cancun Ministerial Conference, the developing world was unanimous in opposing the new issues for taking into consideration. Later both sides agreed to abandon three of the four Singapore issues while retaining trade facilitation in future trade liberalisation discussions.
At the Bali Ministerial Conference, member countries adopted trade facilitation agreement (TFA). It come into entered into force on 22 February 2017 following its ratification by two-thirds of the WTO membership.
