First informal meeting on developing country participation in standard-setting activities and their TBT-related technical assistance needs

摘要

Since May 2000, the WTO's General Council has been examining the concerns raised by various developing countries regarding what they consider to be the inadequate implementation of some WTO agreements. With regard to the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (the SPS Agreement) and the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (the TBT Agreement), developing countries proposed, inter alia, that: "International standard-setting organizations shall ensure the presence of countries at different levels of development and from all geographical regions, throughout all phases of standard-setting." On 18 October 2000, the WTO's General Council agreed that WTO Members should consider dealing with this proposal under the TBT Agreement, on the basis of elements similar to those identified for the SPS Agreement, which were as follows: 1 encouraging international standard-setting organizations to ensure the participation of Members at different levels of development and from all geographic regions, throughout all of standard development; 2 requesting the Director-General to explore, with relevant international standard-setting organizations and intergovernmental organizations, financial and technical mechanisms to assist the participation of developing countries in standard-setting activities; 3 requesting the Director-General to coordinate efforts with relevant international standard-setting organizations to identify SPS-related technical assistance needs and how best to address these, taking into consideration the importance of bilateral and regional technical assistance in this regard; and 4 requesting the Director-General to make a progress report on his initiatives regarding elements 2 and 3 above to the General Council at its Special Session in December 2000. The WTO's Director-General, Mike Moore, thus decided to convene informal meetings with the relevant organizations in order to identify ways of facilitating developing country participation in standard-setting activities addressing their technical assistance needs. The WTO does not have a list of "international standard-setting organizations", but the OIML was invited to participate in these meetings as an organization which has observer status in the TBT Committee.