G/TBT/W/755  
 
28 May 2021  
(21-4438) Page: 1/2 
Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade  Original: English  
 
 
PROPOSAL S ON TRANSPARENCY, AND THE SHARING OF WRITTEN QUESTIONS AND 
RESPONSES FROM MEMBERS ON SPECIFIC TRADE CONCERNS  
NINTH TRIENNIAL REVIEW  
Submission from Singapore  
The following submission,  dated 28 May 2021, is being circulated at the request of the delegation of 
Singapore . 
 
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1  PROPOSAL ON TRANSPARENCY: PROVISION OF TRANSLATIONS FOR ALL NOTIFIED 
DOCUMENTS IN THE WTO 'S THREE OFFICIAL LANGUAGES  
1.1.  Singapore recognises the importance for Members to notify new and revised technical 
regulations, standards and their related conformity assessment procedures in a timely and 
comprehensive manner, to allow other Members and relevant stakeholders to acquaint themselves 
with and adapt to new measur es. A key aspect is ensuring access to the notified document s in the 
three WTO languages . The Committee should continue its work on facilitating the sharing of 
translations, including  unofficial translations.  
1.2.  In light of technological advancements on trans lation software, which could translate a large 
amount of text in a short period, the Committee and the Secretariat could  explore incorporating the 
use of such software in Members ' submission of notifications. This could offer benefits, such as:  
a. Addressing Members ' concerns on the lack of translation capacity, especially for developing 
and least developed Members, to make timely notifications of their proposed TBT 
measures or  review  the large number of notifications by other Members.  
b. By providing  fast translations of the notified documents, the comment period of the 
notified measures is better optimised to allow stakeholders to promptly understand the 
proposed new requirements and engage with the notifying Member.  
1.3.  Possible outcome : Building on Me mbers ' obligations under the TBT Agreement and the 
Committee 's recommendations and work, Singapore proposes for the Committee and the Secretariat 
to explore the use of available IT tools such as translation software. Such translation software could 
be empl oyed on the WTO 's TBT Notification Submission System (NSS) to provide unofficial 
translations of all notified documents into the three official WTO languages, if official translations are 
not already provided. In addition to the benefits mentioned above, t he proposal enables WTO 
Members to have a common unofficial translation. When compared with each Member having their 
own translations, the proposal could benefit notifying Members in potentially reducing the enquiries 
for clarifications on their notified m easure due to translation accuracy. Notifying Members may also 
choose to verify the automatically translated texts and make any revisions as necessary.   
  G/TBT/W/755  
 
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  2  PROPOSAL ON SHARING OF INFORMATION ON MEMBERS ' ENGAGEMENTS RELATING TO 
SPECIFIC TRADE CONCERNS  THAT A RE NOT CIRCULATED WITHIN THE TBT COMMITTEE  
2.1.  Over the years, there has been a steady increase in the number of STCs raised at the TBT 
Committee meetings, with bulk of the time at these meetings being dedicated to the discussion of 
STCs. It has been a longsta nding interest of Members to ensure that STCs are discussed more 
efficiently at the Committee.   
2.2.  Singapore observes that in the discussion of STCs, the responding Member may require 
additional time (e.g. for internal coordination or domestic consultation) to provide a response, and 
may request to provide the response  intersessional ly. Such intersessional responses are often 
provided bilaterally. Members often raise overlapping concerns, some of which may have been, or 
will be , addressed in the bilateral resp onses to other Members ' enquiries . Hence, sharing such 
bilateral responses with the Committee could help to advance discussions and facilitate healthy 
progress towards resolving STCs. This would also increase the efficiency of discussions on STCs 
during th e TBT Committee meetings.   
2.3.  Possible outcome : For the Committee to recommend that Members share  information on  their 
engagements that relate to discussions on Specific Trade Concerns , which are held outside of the 
Committee 's regular meetings . Information on such engagements can be  published in the  WTO 
Documents Online portal. To facilitate the tracking of such information , Members should inform the 
Secretariat to reference the uploaded documents according to the respective the IMS IDs, on the 
TBT IMS. To enable these shared information  to complement the discussion s on STCs at the TBT 
Committee meetings, an additional column can be included within the annotated draft agenda and/or 
the eAgenda , with links to access the information , where available . This would make it easier for 
Members to refer to such information during their preparations ahead of the TBT Committee 
meetings.  
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