Negotiations on expanding the Information Technology Agreement (ITA), a tariff cutting mechanism under the World Trade Organization (WTO) has made a major breakthrough. WTO members representing major exporters of information technology products on July 24 agreed to eliminate tariffs on 201 IT products within 3 years, according to WTO's press release, reported by People’s Daily.

As the biggest tariff cutting agreement reached by the WTO in 18 years, the agreement will have a series of ripple effects. The annual trade value of the 201 IT products account for 7 percent of the global trade volume.

The American Chamber of Commerce predicts that the agreement will contribute 190 billion USD of GDP growth to global economy.

Industry insiders point out that major member countries of the agreement represent 99 percent of IT products export value. The ITA expansion will give strong impetus to the development of the global trade and IT industry.

According to the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), China, as the world's biggest IT products exporter, will reduce and exempt about 8 billion USD of tariffs within the expanded tariff cutting list of IT products, and add 12 billion USD more export value annually.