Submission Overview

The ECA welcomes the opportunity to reiterate its support for Australia’s accession to the WTO GPA given the significant benefits it will offer Australian exporters through improving access to international procurement markets and promoting transparency and non-discrimination in the tendering process.

While many Australian businesses can already tender for government contracts in some of the WTO GPA member countries, accession to the GPA will provide legally binding access, thus providing safeguards against any future protectionist measures introduced by GPA parties, while delivering the certainty of a ‘multilateral rules-based system’.