Issues Of Determining Specificity In Countervailing Investigations Of WTO System

The thesis studies the matter of specificity determination in Subsidies and Countervailing Measures Agreement(or SCM Agreement).Specificity is the premise of adopting countervailing measures.SCM Agreement only stipulates the principles of specificity determination,without detailed rules.It means specificity determination has its uncertainty.Therefore,setting out from the concept of specificity,the thesis analyses and discusses the explanation and application of Article 2 in SCM Agreement.The thesis is divided into four parts.The first part firstly clarifies the concept,features and type of specificity in SCM Agreement,then development of the specificity and thereupon emerging questions.The second part chooses several substantial issues of specificity determination,respectively the determination of "certain enterprise",conditions of regional specificity,"subsidy programme" determination of de facto specificity,and exception of specificity.The third part is the procedure issues of specificity determination,mainly burden of proof and rules of evidence.The forth part includes the dispute that China involved about Article 2 of the SCM Agreement,including the situations,the influence of settled dispute and analysis of unsettled dispute.The thesis concludes that determination of specificity should consider both specific situations and proof of parties.In terms of de jure specificity,"certain enterprise" is not susceptible to rigid quantitative definition.It is considered that when sufficiently broadly available throughout an economy,a subsidy would cease to be specific.But this method is vague and controversial.When determining de facto specificity,the determination of "subsidy programme" is essential.A "subsidy programme " is a kind of independent subsidy mechanism.When determining regional specificity,conditions of subsidy inside the region must be distinguishable from the general one.Finally," positive evidence" in Article 2.4 means the evidence of specificity should be direct,objective and credible.To initiate a countervailing investigation,the evidence should provide an indication that a subsidy is specific.