Editorial Note
During April–August 1949 the United States participated in two separate negotiations at Annecy, France, under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade: the Third Session of the Contracting Parties to the General Agreement; and a tariff negotiating conference, the so-called “second round” under GATT. In respect of the tariff reduction negotiations, the 23 original contracting parties to the Agreement negotiated with ten countries applying at Annecy for accession to the Agreement. The newly acceding ten included Denmark, the Dominican Republic, Finland, Greece, Haiti, Italy, Liberia, Nicaragua, Sweden, and Uruguay. They were represented by observers at the CP’s Third Session. Also present in an observer status at the Third Session were the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC), and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
The same delegation represented the United States at both Annecy conferences, headed by Mr. Woodbury Willoughby, Chief, Division of Commercial Policy, Department of State, and Chairman of the Interdepartmental Committee on Trade Agreements (TAC). John W. Evans, Director, Commodities Division, Office of International Trade, Department of Commerce, was Vice-Chairman. The Delegation was considerably larger than those attending the First and Second Sessions of the Contracting Parties at Habana and Geneva in 1948, consisting of four delegates and ten advisers. For a complete listing, see Department of State Bulletin, April 24, 1949, pages 520 and 521. The Delegation Chairman submitted one Official Report to the Secretary of State for both meetings, an informative 40-page document which is not printed here (see editorial note, page 715). Separate classified reports for each of the conferences were also submitted by Mr. Willoughby; see pages 715 ff.
Both conferences opened on April 8. The thrust of the documentation that follows has to do mainly with certain issues that were considered by the Contracting Parties at the Third Session, rather than with the tariff reduction negotiations, which were conducted on a bilateral basis. The documentation printed here is highly selective and represents only a very small part of the great quantity of paper on the two Annecy conferences which is found in the Department of State’s central indexed file 560.AL; and in the United States Delegation files located in Lot 57D284, Boxes 109 and 110. The Delegation files consist of cables, position papers, memoranda, working reports, correspondence, and public documentation (press releases, etc.) (Box 109); and a comprehensive file of official GATT documentation, including minutes of committee meetings, working party meetings and reports, and [Page 669] official documents (Box 110). Attention is invited to an official GATT Documents Index, Doc. GATT/CP/INF/3/Pt. 1, published by ICITO in November 1951, covering 14 categories of official public GATT documentation from 1947/1948 through November 5, 1951, that is, through the Torquay Tariff Negotiating Conference and the Sixth Session of the Contracting Parties.