WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SPS/GEN/320
10 June 2002
(02-3189)
Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Original:  English
MEMBERSHIP IN WTO AND INTERNATIONAL STANDARD-SETTING BODIES
Submission by the European Communities
1. In the note G/SPS/GEN/49/Rev.4 on 30 April 2002, the Secretariat provides information
regarding the membership of the WTO and of the three standard-setting bodies explicitly referred to
in the SPS Agreement.
2. The European Communities would like to thank the Secretariat and to draw Members’
attention to the fact that the European Communities is not a member of the Codex Alimentarius, OIE
and IPPC.  This situation is not satisfactory because the European Communities has a large amount of
competence in all the areas covered by these three standard-setting bodies.
3. Moreover, the SPS Agreement stipulates in Article 3.4 that:
"Members shall play a full part, within the limits of their resources, in the relevant
international organizations and of their subsidiary bodies, in particular the Codex
Alimentarius Commission, the International Office  of Epizootics, and the international and
regional organizations operating within the framework of the International Plant Protection
Convention, to promote, within these organizations, the development and periodic review of
standards, guidelines and recommendations with respect to all aspects of sanitary and
phytosanitary measures."
4. For these reasons, the European Communities requested the Codex Alimentarius Commission
to amend its internal Rules of Procedure to allow for membership of regional economic integration
organizations.  An information note from the European Communities (CX/GP 02/INF.1) has been
circulated amongst members of the Codex Alimenta rius Commission in order to clarify the manner in
which the European Communities will exercise its membership rights on an alternative basis with itsmember States, and the practical consequences on the functioning of the meetings of the Codex
Alimentarius Commission and its subsidiary bodies.  A copy of this note is attached for information of
the Members of the SPS Committee.
5. The European Communities hopes that the Members of the SPS Committee will support the
membership of the European Communities to the Codex Alimentarius Commission.G/SPS/GEN/320
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ANNEX
Agenda Item 6 CX/GP 02/INF.1
JOINT FAO/WHO FOOD STANDARDS PROGRAMME
CODEX COMMITTEE ON GENERAL PRINCIPLES
Seventeenth Session
Paris, France,  15 - 19 April 2002
MEMBERSHIP IN THE CODEX ALIMENTARIUS COMMISSION OF REGIONAL
ECONOMIC INTEGRATION ORGANIZATIONS
INFORMATION NOTE
SUBMITTED BY THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITY
BACKGROUND
1. At the sixteenth session of the Codex Committee on General Principles (hereinafter CCGP), held
in Paris on 23-27 April 2001, the Codex Alimentarius Secretariat introduced a working document
proposing amendments to the Procedural Manual of the Codex Alimentarius Commission in order
to allow Regional Economic Integration Organisations (hereinafter "REIO") to become members
of the Codex Alimentarius Commission.
2. Article 2 of the Statutes of the Codex Alimentarius Commission1 allows the European
Community, as a full member of FAO since 1991, to notify the Director General of FAO of its
wish to become a full Member of the Co dex Alimentarius Commission when the proposed
amendments to the Codex Alimentarius Rules of Procedure are adopted.
3. In the above CCGP meeting, certain delegations raised some questions on the consequences of the
proposed amendments enabling REIOs to become full Members, in particular with regard to the
distribution of the respective competence between the European Community and its Member
States in the areas falling within Codex Alimentarius areas of work.  Other delegations requested
clarifications on whether the proposed changes to the Rules of Procedure would enable the
Member States of REIOs to enjoy privileges that are not currently available to other individualMembers of the Codex Alimentarius Commission.  Moreover, some delegations pointed out that,
                                                     
1 "Membership of the Commission is open to all Member Nations and Associate Members of FAO and
WHO which are interested in international food standards. Membership shall comprise such of these nations as
have notified the Director General of FAO or of WHO of their desire to be considered as Members ."G/SPS/GEN/320
Page 3
over the years, the work of the Codex Alimentarius had been enriched by the diversity of views
expressed by all Members and that this should continue.
4. The European Community submitted in May 2001 an Information Note (CAC/LIM-10) to the
Codex Alimentarius Commission in order to respond to the points raised by some Members at the
16th  session of the CCGP, in particular the manner in which the European Community will
exercise its membership rights on an alternative basis with its Member States, and the practical
consequences on the functioning of the meetings of the Codex Alimentarius Commission and its
subsidiary bodies.
5. At the 24 th session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission (Geneva, 2-7 July 2001), the
Commission recalled (ALINORM 01/41, paragraphs 87 and 88) that the CCGP had not reached a
decision on the proposals to amend the Rules of Procedure to allow the participation of REIOs as
Members of the Codex Alimentarius Commission.  Revised proposals had been put forward to theCCGP meeting, after further discussions and c onsultations between the Legal Counsels of FAO,
WHO and the European Commission.  As the quorum was not constituted, the Codex
Alimentarius Commission decided to defer the discussion of the proposed amendments to the
Rules of Procedure until its next session.  The Commission decided to request the CCGP in the
meantime to consider them thoroughly, in order to clarify relevant issues and facilitate the debateat the next session in April 2002.
6. The purpose of the present Information Note is to follow up on the previous one by responding to
the comments made since then by some Members of Codex Alimentarius and by providing, in a
comprehensive manner, additional information and clarifications, in particular with regard to the
nature and powers of a REIO in the areas of work of the Codex Alimentarius.
REGIONAL ECONOMIC INTEGRATION ORGANISATIONS
7. The term "Regional Economic Integration Organisation" is a well-known and established concept
that is being used in a very large number of international agreements and conventions.  In short, it
denotes an organisation to which the participating sovereign states have agreed to transferauthority and powers in a number of domains with the general objective to integrate their
economies into a free trade or a customs union.  Today, the European Community is the most
advanced of all the REIOs that exist.
8. Article II.(4) of the Constitution of the FAO specifi es that to be eligible to apply for membership
of the FAO, an organisation must be constituted by sovereign states, a majority of which are
member nations of the FAO, and to which its member states have transferred competence over a
range of matters in the fields covered by the FAO, including the authority to make decisionsbinding on its member states in respect to those matters.  There is no doubt that the European
Community fulfils these conditions both as re gards matters falling unde r the statute of FAO as
well as under the statute of the Codex Alimentarius Commission.
9. All member states of the European Community are sovereign states.  They are member nations of
the FAO and of the Codex Alimentarius Commission.  They are bound with the Treatyestablishing the European Community, which aims to establish, inter ali a, a common market, an
economic and monetary union and to implement common policies or actions in a very large
number of domains.  This is in particular the case in the areas of safety and health, consumer
protection, setting of food standards and of promoting fair practices and international trade.  It
follows that the European Community has a larg e amount of competence in all the areas covered
by the Codex Alimentarius Commission.  The im plementation of the tasks entrusted to the
European Community by the EC Treaty is ensured by its competent institutions.  The European
Commission is authorised to represent the Europ ean Community internationally, including beforeG/SPS/GEN/320
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the FAO.  This will be also the case, after completing the accession, before the Codex
Alimentarius Commission.
REPARTITION OF COMPETENCE
10. Article II(5) of the Constitution of the FAO stipul ates that each REIO applying for membership to
FAO submits a declaration of competence specifying the matters in respect of which competence
has been transferred to it by its member states.  Although the actual repartition of competence
between the European Community and its Member States is an internal matter that is decided on
the basis of European Community law, the Memb ers of Codex Alimentarius should know that, as
is established practice, a declaration on the repartition of competence between the European
Community and its member states will be deposited upon its formal accession to the Codex
Alimentarius.  A copy of this 3 initial repartition of competence for matters covered by CodexAlimentarius is attached hereto (Attachment 1 ).  In addition, the general rules of the FAO stipulate
that before any type of FAO meeting it should be indicated who between the REIO or its member
states has competence and which of them shall exercise the right to vote in respect of each agenda
item.
11. It should be noted that the proposed amendments to the Codex Alimentarius’ Rules of Procedures
do not deviate in any substantive way from what is already applicable in the context of FAO since
1991.  As the European Community has been a full member of FAO, the above provisions have
been applied during all its meetings.  As examples, the declarations deposited by the European
Community in the International Conference on International Food Trade beyond 2000
(Melbourne 11-15 October 1999) and the 31st session of the FAO Conference (Rome, 2-13
November 2001) are attached hereto for the in formation of the Codex Alimentarius Members
(Attachments 2 and 3) .  In practical terms, the chairman reminds the participants at the beginning
of each meeting what the declaration provided by the European Community lays down on the
distribution of competence and how the right to vote for each item on the agenda of the meeting
will be exercised.  This procedure has been working without any problem for the other membersof the FAO since 1991 and there is indeed no reason to suggest that it may not work in the
framework of the meetings of the Codex Alimentarius Commission and its subsidiary bodies.
12. Moreover, any Member of the Codex Alimentarius Commission may request additional
information on the competence of the European Community and of its Member States with regard
to any specific agenda item or question.  The distribution of the competence at the meetings of the
Codex Alimentarius Commission will, therefore, not suffer from any ambiguity and it is expected
that very soon the other Codex Members will become fully acquainted with such distribution andexercise of competence, as this is now the situation in the context of FAO.
RIGHTS TO VOTE
13. The European Community will exercise the right to vote of its Member States for the issues
falling within its part of competence.  This means that the European Community membership in
the Codex Alimentarius Commission will not provide additional or extra voting rights whatsoever
to the European Community or its Member States beyond those they actually enjoy.  Simply, the
European Community will be counted as representing a number of votes equal to the number of
its Member States that are entitled to vote in the meeting, which means that whenever there are
requirements to register and present credentials in order to be able to vote they are respected.  Inany case, the European Community will never have sixteen votes.  In reality, therefore, nothing
will change, since the votes will be expressed by the representative of the European Community
instead of being expressed individually by the delegations of the Member States in the cases
where the competence will belong to the European Community.G/SPS/GEN/320
Page 5
DIVERSITY OF VIEWS
14. The diversity of views expressed by the Memb ers of the Codex Alimentarius Commission will
not be affected or diminished in any way by the accession of the European Community.  Indeed,
until now when the European Community expresse d a view in a field of its competence, its
position was the agreed position of its Member States.  As already explained, currently this
position is expressed by the Member State that holds the (revolving) Presidency of the European
Community.  The search for a consensus within the Codex Alimentarius Commission or its
subsidiary bodies requires a large diversity of views and the Member States of the European
Community will not, and indeed should not, be prevented from taking part fully in these
frequently technical debates.  Only when the co mpetence on an issue falls within the competence
of the European Community its representative will express acceptance for the purposes ofachieving consensus (or will vote if the issue is put to a vote).
15. In practical terms, therefore, the adoption of the proposal for amending the Rules of Procedure
should have no impact on the nature and richness of the debate that has traditionally characterised
the discussions within Codex Alimentarius.  It is expected that the other Members of the Codex
Alimentarius will gain in clarity, in comparis on to the current situation, where the same delegate
expresses either the 4 position of its own Member State (on national matters) or the position of the
15 Member States (on matters of competence belonging to the European Community).
WORLD TRADE ORGANISATION
16. It should also be noted that the European Community has been a full member of the World Trade
Organisation (WTO) since 1995.  The Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and
Phytosanitary Measures (SPS Agreement) of the WTO established that the sanitary measures
which conform to international standards, guidelines or recommendations would be presumed to
be consistent with the requirements of the agreement (Article 3.2).  In addition, the SPS
Agreement considers that for food safety, the re levant international standards, guidelines and
recommendations are those which are established by the Commission of the Codex Alimentarius
(Annex A, paragraph 3.a.).  Also in Article 3.4, the SPS Agreement stipulates that:
"Members shall play a full part, within the limits of their resources, in the relevant
international organisations and of their subsidiary bodies, in particular the Codex
Alimentarius Commission, the International Office of Epizootics, and the international and
regional organisations operating within the fr amework of the International Plant Protection
Convention, to promote, within these organisat ions, the development and periodic review of
standards, guidelines and recommendations with respect to all aspects of sanitary and
phytosanitary measures"
17. Moreover, the WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT Agreement) contains
similar provisions.  In this Agreement the Codex Alimentarius Commission is a relevantinternational standard setting body, in the sense of Article 2.4. thereof.  In particular, Annex 1. 4.
of the TBT Agreement provides that an international standard setting body or system is the " Body
or system whose membership is open to the relevant bodies of at least all Members" .
18. The current factual and legal situation does not enable the European Community to take part as a
full member in the various activities of the Codex Alimentarius Commission despite the fact thatit has the substantive authority to implement the Codex Alimentarius standards, guidelines and
recommendations in a very large number of domains.G/SPS/GEN/320
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19. It follows that it would be incoherent that an international standard setting body for food products,
specifically designated by the WTO as being the reference for the conformity of the measures to
the requirements of the SPS and TBT Agreements, is not in a position to admit as full member all
members of the WTO.  This would be inconsistent with the relevant provisions of the SPS and
TBT Agreements explained above and would not be in line with international law.  The status ofCodex Alimentarius as a relevant international standard setting body is, therefore, likely to be
jeopardised if full membership cannot be granted to all Members of the WTO, including the
European Community.
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