International Trade Organization (Interim Commission)

On April 8, 1949, more than 500 delegates and assistants from thirty-four countries met in Annecy, France, for trade meetings convened to discuss tariff barriers and other problems of international trade. Twenty-three nations already adhered to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and eleven others wished to join it. The first of such meetings had been held in Geneva in 1947. The first meeting of the series held in Annecy concluded on April 22 after adopting a declaration defining the position of Palestine in relation to the agreement and adopting a decision to seek emergency measures to resolve the crisis of the Cuban textile industry. The meeting also studied charges of trade restrictions, plans for customs unions, problems of new tariff negotiations, African import restrictions that had introduced discriminations against imports from dollar and other hard currency areas, the dispute between India and Pakistan over rebate of the excise tax on exports to Pakistan from India, the South African–Southern Rhodesian customs union and modifications of various countries' tariff schedules introduced since 1947.