G/TBT/GEN/194  
 
3 May 2016  
(16-2476)  Page: 1/2  
Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade  Original: English  
 
UPDATE ON UNECE ACTIVITIES  
STATEMENT BY THE UNITED NATIONS ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR EUROPE 
This document contains information provided by the UNECE at the TBT Committee meeting of  
9-10 March 2016 under Agenda Item 5 (Update by Observers). 
 
 
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1.  UNECE would like to recall that its Working Party on Regulatory Cooperation and Standardization Policies develops and shares good regulatory practice in the area of technical 
regulations, standardization policies, and policies related to quality infrastructure as well as 
conformity assessment and market surveillance. It encourages and supports regulatory cooperation among members in specific sectors, such as the equipment used in installations with a 
high risk of explosion.  
2.  The 25th session of the Working Party took place on 2-3 December 2015. The main outcome of 
the session was the discussion on regulatory cooperation and the adoption of the revised recommendation containing the "International Model for Transnational Regulatory Cooperation 
Based on Good Regulatory Practice (http://www.unece.org/f ileadmin/DAM/trade 
/wp6/Recommendations/Rec_L.pdf).  
3.  The International Model provides a voluntary framework for regulatory cooperation that 
facilitates market access through the use of good regulatory practice and options for establishment 
of sectoral arrangements between interested UN member countries. The model is based on the use of relevant international standards as the backbone of regulatory work, and goes further 
recommending that Governments should seek wherever possible to also make use of conformity 
assessment options that build upon international best practice in this field and minimize the duplication of tests and certification activities.  
4.  Further, the Working Party gave mandate to the Bureau and the Secretariat to start 
consultations on the revision of recommendat ions F and G of the Working Party. These 
recommendations are directed to governments and aim at providing guidance on conformity assessment choices that reduce technical barriers to trade and increase safety and compliance. We 
invite interested members of the WTO TBT Committee to contribute to the discussions going 
forward.  
5.  The 25th Session of the WP.6 took place ba ck-to back with the World Standards Cooperation 
(WSC) workshop on Conformity Assessment, which also shared best practice on how to design 
conformity assessment procedures so as to avoid multiple certifications. The report of the annual session of WP.6 is available at: http ://www.unece.org/fileadmi n/DAM/trade/wp6/ 
documents/2015/WP6_2015_02E_report.pdf and ta keaway documents from the WCS workshop 
at: http://www.wsccaworkshop.com/documents . 
6.  Additionally, a joint ITU-IEC-UNECE event on "Standards and regulations" was held on 2-3 
November just before the last WTO TBT meeting. The event showed ways how international 
standards support public policy goals both at national level as well as to implement policy 
commitments taken at the global level (e.g. sustainability, resilience and development goals). The G/TBT/GEN/194 
 
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  agenda, presentations and further reading materials are available from the event website at 
http://www.unece.org/index.php?id=39452#/ . 
7.  Finally, the UNECE WP.6 secretariat co-authored a thinkpiece offering a roadmap for countries 
to enhance regulatory coherence across jurisdictions by engaging in regulatory cooperation. The 
thinkpiece http://www.unece.org/f ileadmin/DAM/trade/ wp6/documents/ref-
docs/E15_ICTSD_WEF.pdf  was published under the E15 initiative of the World Economic Forum 
and the ICTSD.  
8.  Another area of activity that is relevant to members of this Committee are the UNECE studies 
on regulatory and procedural barriers to trade which identify and recommend ways of reducing and or eliminating technical and procedural barri ers to regional and international trade. The 
studies are based on an extensive study of the country's laws and by-laws, and on in-depth 
interviews to relevant stakeholders including the regulatory authorities, the national 
standardization bodies, the conformity assessment bodies, and the business community. The methodology for conducting the studies is available online and in printed form and can be used by 
other international organizations, as well as by the countries themselves, in evaluating existing 
TBTs. Currently, two studies based on this methodology – on Belarus and on Kazakhstan which are not WTO members have been completed. Another study on a recently accessed country, Tajikistan 
was published in the second half of 2014. As regards Tajikistan, a follow-up technical assistance 
project to tackle the barriers that have been identi fied is being planned in cooperation with UNIDO. 
It will be part of the country's post-WTO accession plan. 
 
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