G/TBT/GEN/228  
 
10 July 2017  
(17-3707) Page: 1/2 
Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade    
 
 STATEMENT  DELIVERED BY THE WTO  SECRETARIAT AT  
THE TBT COMMITTEE ME ETINGS OF 14-15 JUNE 2017  
AID FOR TRADE GLOBAL  REVIEW 2017  
This document contains the statement  made by the WTO Secretariat  at the regular meeting on 
14-15 June  2017.  
 
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You might recall that at the last meeting of the TBT Committee I drew your attention to the Aid for 
Trade Global Review 2017 which will be taking place at the WTO Headquarters in Geneva on 
11-13 July 2017. This year, the focus will be on "Promoting Trade, Inc lusiveness and Connectivity 
for Sustainable Development".  Given that theme, the Trade and Environment Division will be 
contributing to the event by co -organising or participating in a number of events that are relevant 
to standards – so I take this opportu nity to provide you with an update and a description o f these 
events.  
1  CLICKS NEED BRICKS: PROMOTING TRADE THRO UGH QUALITY INFRASTR UCTURE  
1.1.  This side event is organized by Germany, World Bank Group, UNCTAD and ICTSD,  with 
support from us in the Trade and Envi ronment Division .  The event is essentially about the 
importance of quality infrastructure, or what we in this Committee refer to as "technical 
infrastructure" for competitiveness and trade. This Committee often hears  about  the difficulty of 
demonstrating compliance with requirements in export markets and how this often translates into 
significant technical barriers to trade. In this context , while IT and connectivity – "clicks" – 
certainly offer great trade potential, the issue of basic quality infrastruct ure – "bricks" – is vital for 
goods to actually cross borders. In this event, which we think will also have a particular interest to 
SMEs, there will be an opportunity to both understand what is happening on quality infrastructure, 
and its relevance to the TBT Agreement and to trade  in general.  There will be interventions from 
the World Bank, UNIDO,  UNCTAD, the WTO Secretariat , academia, and regional organizations – 
and we do hope you will be able to join that discussion.  
2  HOW CAN AID FOR TRAD E CONNECT SMES MORE EFFECTIVELY TO VALUE CHAINS IN 
GREEN GOODS AND SERV ICES?  
2.1.  This side event , co-organiz ed with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development – 
EBRD  and the Trade and Environment Division will be  an opportunity to hear directly from SMEs 
about the main bottlenecks they face when trying to access global supply chains for green goods 
and services. The panel will include SMEs who will talk  about their own experiences.  " Green" 
supply chains are a growing area of focus for Aid for Trade donors such as E BRD. In particular, in 
supply chains today, sustainability standards are an important instrument that are on the one 
hand used to help SMEs achieve better economic and environmental outcomes, and on the other, 
they also pose significant challenges for conn ecting and integrating to global value chains. This 
discussion will certainly involve standards, technical regulations and conformity assessment and 
we hope that you will be able to join us for this event.  G/TBT/GEN/228  
 
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  3  EPING: HELPING SMES KEEP TRACK OF PRODUC T REQUIRE MENTS IN THEIR EXPOR T 
MARKETS  
3.1.  The third event is on ePing, our new SPS/TBT notification alert system . The event will focus 
on how ePing can help SMEs to keep track of products requirements in their export markets.  This 
event, sponsored by Australia, in clo se cooperation with the Trade and Environment Division , will 
focus on how ePing can assist SMEs to keep track of regulatory developments . It will also be an 
opportunity for us to identify challenges and opportunities for scaling -up this new tool to further  
promote connectivity between SMEs and their export markets. The experiences of our own 
implementation of ePing, together with our partners (UNDESA, ITC) as well as some regional 
organisations will be quite instructive in this discussion.  I would also like  to take this opportunity to 
inform you that the Secretariat has made available a Room document ( contained in RD/TBT/223)1, 
which summarizes the results of the ePing survey undertaken earlier this year. This is in response 
to requests by some Members for t his data. Overall, the feedback has been very encouraging and 
shows that ePing fills a gap for public and private stakeholders and we are getting increasingly 
more requests for training on this particular tool.  
4  TRADE AND FOOD STAND ARDS, JOINT FAO -WTO PUBL ICATION   
4.1.  This publication will be launched by WTO DG Azevêdo and FAO DG Graziano on 13 July. The 
Trade and Environment Division, together with the Agriculture and Commodities Division, authored 
the WTO contributions together with counterparts in the FAO. T he publication sets out how FAO 
and WTO provide governments with the means to establish a framework to facilitate trade on the 
basis of internationally agreed food standards, highlighting the work of the Codex Alimentarius 
Commission and WTO SPS and TBT Co mmittees.   
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1 Subsequently circulated in G/TBT/GEN/227/Rev.1