WTO: in what ways might the lives of ordinary citizens of Kazakhstan change

QUALITY OF LIFE: IN WHAT WAYS LIFE AND ECONOMIC CONDITIONS CHAGE 4

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WTO: in what ways might the lives of ordinary citizens of Kazakhstan change

Introduction

world trade international

My topic belongs to field «Social Science» and includes economic, social and political aspects. My question is «In what ways might the quality of lives of ordinary citizens of Kazakhstan change if Kazakhstan joined to WTO?» I had problems with simple things such as expensive medical service, bad traffic, high bills poor water and poor air and it really need solving because these problems creates other ones as health injury that is why I will research it. This topic is urgent nowadays because it has a big influence to the future development of Kazakhstani people also it relates to changing in daily and business life of Kazakhstan citizens. My opponents will be people from «old school» and entrepreneurs who are totally adapted to the old regime of dealing business and they can say that the new changes by trying to create new opportunities for improving the quality of life are only extra complication. So, my target audience will be people who are worried about the improving quality of life. I'm taking the role of advocate who will research advantages of entering to WTO and to clarify some opportunities which we might have. There are two problems in collecting information to this topic, unlimited source of information and to find person who can give clear answer on this case. Original thing in my research will be the conversation and I hope that I will be able to speak with some people who has an experience in this sphere also it can be a person from economics sphere who is competence to answer for questions.

This topic is urgent because it has a big influence to the future development of Kazakhstani people also it relates to changing in daily and business life of Kazakhstan citizens. This situation influences on many fields as work, health and daily life of ordinary life of Kazakhstani people.

For example, the wages of people are too different that is there is no certain average wage and it is a problem of work places, people can't find a jobs with good wage. People are divided into classes as rich, average people and people who has low standard of living. In the situation with rich people everything is clear but when a poor person tries to use medical service there is a problem that it is very expensive. Also there is a problem with environment from a surplus of cars which hurts a nature and makes injury to human health and it influences of citizens lifespan. About the daily life there are also problems with moving as traffic jams which are create lateness.

WTO might play a big role in professional lives of Kazakhstani people because it is an internationally recognized global center of customs expertise and plays a leading role in the discussion, development and improvement of techniques of customs and customs legislation. Activities of the organization are formulated on the basis of requests of its members. Tools and best practices in the WTO recognized as the foundation for modern customs. The main purpose of the WTO is to enhance the efficiency of the customs services of the member countries through measures to promote their national development: enhancing national security, increase tax collection and compilation of statistics on foreign trade. Of course, all these things will have influence on the life quality of ordinary Kazakhstani citizens.

Costumer's service it is a providing client with necessary goods or services, sometimes both of these before, during and after his purchasing. Communal services are related to customer service and also important part of quality of life. So, communal is kind services which is providing to users to make their life comfortable. But in Kazakhstan it has lack quality in providing this kind of services. For example, if the apartment owner will have to leave his flat for a long time he can temporarily refuse the required communal services not including internet or TV but there is a defect by the returning he can find that bills are still coming and he should pay for not used things. Also I met this problem too when I returned from my city to Almaty after holidays. Cold water should be provided to the consumer in pure and drinkable form of appropriate quality supplied in required quantities but it also has a defect in pureness. It is a problem of filtering water because the system is not able to clean water to drinkable form that is why people buys and sets water filter devices.

Life quality index is a thing which describes way of life for whole citizens of certain country. For example, things as length of life, health and income are part of life quality of index and it really important thing for each country. Life quality also depends from life conditions as environment (air, water, geographical situation) and economics (income, work conditions, level of unemployment). In Kazakhstan average length of life is around 65 years and a lot of factors influence on it. There are also problems with the death rate as the road accidents and cardiovascular disease. It means that in our roads there are a lot of aggressive and not experienced drivers and reason is no strict control. So, about the heart disease also it is the main reason of dying citizens, it of course problem of medicine and environment. Our life quality shows that we are not developed well and Kazakhstan still developing country.

Life priorities of people are things which is first necessarily to have stabile live. In other words it is a main component of life. Every person has his own priorities for ones it is a good work, good health for others good education, comfortable home or health food. By the priorities we can determine the conditions in which he lives. For example, country can be very industrialized and have a lot of work place but the environment can have bad effect on human health, on this situation in the first order will be priority to have good and cheap medical services instead of have a job. Therefore the priorities mean much for the individual and I guess that it will be good field to research on my topic.

1. Literature Review

The main theme of my research is Quality of Life and topic is «in what ways might the quality of lives of ordinary citizens of Kazakhstan change if Kazakhstan joined to WTO?». So, I decided to focus my literature review on the research articles on quality of life of some countries. It will be helpful to find the minuses of it and decide that which spheres of usual life could be improved. The reason why I decided to research life conditions of countries is that to make some comparison between our living standards with others it will be easier to find advantages and disadvantages in ordinary lives of ordinary citizens. The literature review will focus on 4 main aspects: «what is the WTO and its purpose?», «WTO member countries», economic advantages and disadvantages», «perspectives».

2. What is the WTO and its purpose?

To begin with, we need to define what is WTO and a brief information about its history. Short explanation of WTO was defined by B. Hoekman (2000) as «the international organization created for the purpose of liberalization of international trade and regulation of the trade and political relations of member states». It means that WTO controls the implementation of the trade agreements concluded between of its members, also organizes and ensures trade negotiations among members. There are one hundred fifty nine countries that are already have membership in this organization. In the WTO more than thirty countries have the status of observers, and Kazakhstan one of them. Procedure of accession to the WTO consists of several stages and this process takes on average 5-7 years. «The escalating role of world trade crammed the industrial countries in the XIX century to support at the international level limited cooperation concerning the customs duties. The global economic crisis which burst in 1929 and attempts of its overcoming in the certain developed countries by direct protection of domestic market the high customs duties from foreign import showed that at the increasing volumes of foreign trade its institutionalization and supranational regulation in a recognized international legal framework is necessary» (Fergusson, Ian F., 2007). The idea of creation of the international organization urged to regulate international trade arose even before the end of World War II. According to the author based on general efforts of the USA and Great Britain in 1944 conference were established the International Monetary Fund and the International bank of reconstruction and development. The third support of a new economic order along with the mentioned organizations supposed creation of the International Trade Organization (ITO). Then nearly 50 years later after unsuccessful attempts of creation of the international organization since January 1, 1995 of the WTO got to work.

3. WTO member countries and Kazakhstan

The first country which will be talked about is Saudi Arabia that is similar to Kazakhstan with its natural resources. Saudi Arabia joined WTO in 2005. Officials and expert community of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in general estimate consequences of the accession of KSA to the WTO positively (D.N. Rao, 2007).According to «Global Competitiveness Report» following the results of 2011 Saudi Arabia took the eleventh place in the rating of the countries with the best conditions for business made by the World bank, having pushed aside on the second plan such countries as France, Switzerland and Austria. After joining WTO KSA took the ninth place in a rating of the largest recipients of direct foreign investments in the world.

Another country which will be mentioned is China. This country entered the World Trade Organization in 2001. Chinese experts admitted that accession to WTO in general allowed China to increase inflow of foreign investments, expand export volumes and to maintain high rates of economic growth. The social sphere gained development. The income of both city, and countryside people grew. Only for the first five years after the entry of China into the WTO the number of the poor population in villages decreased by five million people, the net per capita income of country people rapidly exceeded as its average annual growth. The sector of commercial services - tourism, transport, communication, computer and information and other services began to develop dynamically.

Next country that should be considered is Japan. So the first thing about Japan which we should mention is that this country one of the most digitalized, in other words The International Tele communication Union measured that ordinary people in Japan has easy access to the variety of digital information affordably and equitably and takes second place among 181 countries in the world (Inoguchi & Fujii, 2008). The second point which related to our topic is about life priorities list having enough to eat, having a comfortable home, being healthy and having access to good medical care if required. The priorities of each country are unique and it depends from life conditions. For example, citizens from countries with bad air and poor water have to use medical service more than others. The third point which I found necessarily is about prices. In the large metropolitan areas prices for housing is high and in this case Japan is close to Kazakhstani.

4. Economic advantages and disadvantages

According to E. Utembayeva (in February, 1999 - the Chairman of Agency on strategic planning and reforms, nowadays - the deputy prime minister of RK), «a strategic objective of Kazakhstan - to enter the World Trade Organization on rather good conditions for the country». According to him, in the conditions of world financial crisis «the existing standard procedures for accession to WTO not really suitable. Kazakhstan will demand the same rights in the organization what the developed countries have. Kazakhstan within future WTO membership took and will take a hard line on upholding of the rights and national interests». Having announced the decision of accession to this international organization, the states pursue definite purposes: benefits and advantages which will be got by the country, being the participant of the organization.

The biggest problem for our businessmen is due to the flow of import of goods from abroad perhaps will lead to low competitiveness of a domestic production that is not best-selling in the world market. After that domestic enterpreneurs will be forced to lower the prices for goods in order to compete with high-quality import and this probably will lead to dissapearence of domestic product from the market. Despite this fact advantages are prevailing. The first thing that should be considered is equality in international trade, the same privileges and rules by which all member countries of the WTO trade. Another positive point is that after accession Kazakhstan will attract foreign investments. The next advantage is the delivering high-quality products on domestic market. Also we must consider that this accession will give to our country an economy gain.

5. Perspectives

Today's Kazakhstan carried to the category of developing countries is unique that takes place among the world's largest exporters of wheat and it is a good result. Despite it, Kazakhstan announced the decision to enter in members of the WTO and it will be perspective step. Ofcourse perspectives are obvious - domestic goods will get access to the markets of other countries without any discrimination, there will be an additional inflow of investments, and not only in raw sector, but also in other branches of economy.

At the same time it is necessary to emphasize that all these benefits and advantages don't come automatically. Everything depends on conditions that Kazakhstan will take to enter into this international organization.

In general we need to analyse seriously all possible consequences of the entry of Kazakhstan into the World Trade Organization. It is necessary to involve scientists and experts into this work as it is already made in Russia. It is necessary to inform the citezens on the course and results of negotiation process on the WTO because all rules of the WTO will directly influence each of us: consumer and producer, exporter and importer. And the more will know the public about requirements of the WTO, the more will be at it opportunities to prepare for them. It is obvious that the WTO is favourably for developed countries which make supercompetitive goods, especially in the field of high technologies and services. Kazakhstan, unfortunately, not in is among now producers of such goods. The WTO is for well developed countries, but at the moment not for us yet. With our goods we aren't waited in the West, we need to keep and develop already available sales markets both in Kazakhstan, and within the CIS countries and only gradually train for accession to WTO.

6. Methodology

The purpose of this research is to find out how accession to WTO by Kazakhstan will influence on economic and ordinary citizens. To answer this question, I met and took the interview from Dorani Mustafa Basir-Ahmadovich and he is deputy director of Logistic Company Aurum Pump Asia. As the friend of my father he agreed to meet with me and take interview. Before our meeting I called to his office and made the appointment but he said that he is very busy that's why he asked me to be concrete when I will take interview. I had to warn him that my questions will be related to the quality of life and how the WTO could affect to this. So, I came to his office and I was little bit confused because when I walked into his office there were a lot of workers who were busy and I understood that time is limited and he is a busy person. Also in reception I saw a man who had also signed up for an appointment but his turn was after my. I entered to his office and sat in front of him I was little bit nervous before we start. During the interview he received about three phone calls and it pushed me to harry up with questions that I prepared for him. Despite this he was friendly and he was trying to give me full information that I needed. With the permission I recorded the interview to my phone. The interview lasted about 40 minutes combining with phone calls.

7. Results

The purpose of this research was to define possible changes in quality of life of Kazakhstani people after joining to WTO. The interviewer was asked several questions related to the topic and his profession. The first question aimed to find connection between his profession and quality of life and how does his job influence on it. He is the deputy director of logistic company and purpose of the company is to satisfy customer's needs so it means that this job has influence on quality of life of citizens. The following question was raised to find out the interviewer's opinion about quality of life in Kazakhstan as a citizen. Actually he is totally satisfied with the life conditions in our country. He also admitted that before, when he lived in Uzbekistan the big problem was the taxation, high taxes for everything, from business to vehicle tax. In this case, living in Kazakhstan is better. Also he claims that you have more opportunities to realize the ideas in our country in comparing with Uzbekistan. Next question was aimed to define how this process can influence on the lives of ordinary people. The interviewer admitted that it is a very controversial issue. Dorani, M. (2014) «Kazakhstan is not enough developed to became a member of WTO. To become a member of WTO Kazakhstan should offer something in return for an opportunity to use a lot of facilities of this trading organization». However Kazakhstan has a big amount of gas and oil so we can afford ourselves to become a member of WTO. Also he claims that accession will be useful and positive for most of fields of life. Another question was focused to find out possible influence on the job of the interviewer. According to Dorani M. the accession will be profitable for them because the number of import will rapidly increase and this is huge amount of work that should be done. After that there were raised question about negative influence of accession. Possible negative consequence can be the low competitiveness of domestic goods due to flow of high-quality import and forced lower prices of domestic product. It will be harmful for the business of domestic entrepreneurs and probably they will need governmental support.

8. Discussion

In what ways might the quality of lives of ordinary citizens of Kazakhstan change if Kazakhstan joined to WTO? My research question belongs to social sciences. The new and important information which I discover from my findings it is that the fields as communal services and infrastructure are very weak developed in our country. I designed my questions in the way that my responder can be able to answer and know that he is competence to do it. From my question I hoped to gain the useful information as influence of WTO, influence of logistics and what the responder think about possible perspectives for economy and for ordinary citizen. I had not find information about the real influence of WTO to lives of ordinary people and decided to try to get this information from my responder. I asked the questions which have connections with his profession.

The first question which I asked was about the connection between his job and quality of life. He answered for my question and he said that good goods makes life quality of customers better. I think his answer proves that logistics have directly influence on it. Also he mentioned about that customers should be happy with any service and I think it is a contribution to improve customer service and it is a little part of life quality. In this interview he described why he thinks that our life conditions are better than in other countries of CIS as an example he told about the taxes in Uzbekistan in his previous place he lived and worked. I think he is really against of their domestic policy. Despite the fact that time was limited responder gave me a lot of information connected with my research.

Conclusion

Kazakhstan is a young and developing country and for such country it is complicated to make choices that will have consequences for the every field of life in our country. Currently Kazakhstan is taking observing place in World Trade Organization and after accession it will be important event for every citizen and future generation of our country.

The aim of this research paper was to find out how this accession will influence on Kazakhstan and in what ways life and economic conditions of ordinary people might change. According to my research the possible changes will be positive for many fields of life. Accession will lead to the access for import goods from another countries, that are already has membership in World Trade Organization. Another good point is decreased custom taxes it means that every citizen will have opportunity to bring goods or another technical device with low custom tax. Next positive side is the high flow of foreign investments that will lead to economic growth of Kazakhstan. However there are some negative effects on domestic enterpreneurs who will be forced to lower the prices for good to compete with the flow of high-quality import and may be they will need governmental support in order not to go out of business. From my literature review I understand that life priorities are one of the most important things which depend from the life quality. Also by the literature review I found that entering to WTO it is a long and complex process which covers the entire field of country it doesn't matter social or economic. WTO has certain requirements to accept a new member. From the interview I found that for every country there are few their own life priorities which are really important for people to have a good life conditions. The results of this research showed many fields of life in Kazakhstan that should be changed to conform to the international standard. The interview showed possible profit for some fields of economy of Kazakhstan. I hope that this accession will lead to the bright future of our country.

References

1) Constantine Michalopoulos «World Trade Organization Accession» (2000) retrieved from: http://www.econbiz.de/Record/world-trade-organization-accession-for-transition-economies-problems-and-prospects-michalopoulos-constantine/10001539601

2) D.N. Rao Suresh Gyan Vihar University (2007). Saudi Arabia's Accession to WTO: Future Challenges Retrieved from: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm? abstract_id=957589

3) Fergusson, F. (9 May 2007). «The World Trade Organization: Background and Issues» Retrieved from: http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/81997.pdf

4) Hoekman, B. (2002). «The WTO: Functions and Basic Principles»

5) Takashi I. & Seiji F. (2008) «Quality of Life in Japan» Retrieved from: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11205-008-9351-3#page-1

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