. /.   WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  G/L/843 
21 November 2007 
 (07-5128) 
  
  
 
REPORT (2007) OF THE COMMITTEE ON  TECHNICAL BARRIERS TO TRADE 
  
1. The Committee held its forty-second to forty-four th regular meetings on 21 March, 5 July and 
9 November 2007, under the Chairmanship of Mr. Margers Krams (Latvia) and Mr. Raminder 
S. Sidhu (India).
1   
2. At each of the meetings in 2007, the Committe e heard statements by a number of Members 
informing the Committee of measures taken to ensu re the implementation and administration of the 
Agreement.  New specific trade concerns were br ought to the attention of the Committee with regard 
to their potential adverse trade e ffects or inconsistency with the Agreement, and the Committee heard 
exchanges on trade concerns that had been previously raised.   
3. During the reporting period, the Committee initia ted an exchange of experiences on issues 
under Future Work items agreed at the Fourth Trie nnial Review of the Operation and Implementation 
of the Agreement under Article 15.4, concluded on 9 November 2006 (G/TBT/19), namely: good 
regulatory practice, conformity assess ment procedures, transparency, technical assistance and special 
and differential treatment.  With a view to deepening understanding of the contribution good 
regulatory practice can make to the implementation of the TBT Agreement and advancing its work in 
this area, the Committee agreed to hold a workshop on good regulatory practice on 
18-19 March 2008.2   On transparency, the Committee discussed, inter alia , the feasibility of attaching 
electronic versions of draft regulatory texts to notific ations and ways to enhance sharing of unofficial 
translations of such texts.  On technical assist ance, the TBT Committee discussed the functioning of 
the format for the voluntary notification of sp ecific technical assistance  needs and responses 
(G/TBT/16) and initiated an exchange of experience s regarding the delivery and receipt of technical 
assistance. 
4. The Fifth Special Meeting on Procedures for Information Exchange was held 
on 7-8 November 2007.3  This meeting addressed issues relating to:  publication practices;  
notification practices;  use of electronic tools; and technical cooperation and the work of Enquiry 
Points.   
5. At its meeting on 21 March 2007, the Committe e adopted its report of the Twelfth Annual 
Review of the Implementation and Operation of the TBT Agreement (G/TBT/21/Rev.1 and Corr.1).  
At the same meeting, the Committee carried out the Twelfth Annual Review of the Code of Good 
Practice for the Preparation, Adoption and Applicati on of Standards.  This work was based on the 
following background documents:  a list of standard izing bodies that have accepted the Code in 2006 
(G/TBT/CS/1/Add.11), a list of standardizing bodi es that have accepted the Code since 1 January 
1995 (G/TBT/CS/2/Rev.13 and Corr.1) and the Twelfth Edition of the WTO TBT Standards Code Directory prepared by the ISO/IEC Information Centre.   
                                                     
 
1 G/TBT/M/41-43. 
2 A draft programme for the workshop on good regulatory practice is contained in JOB(07)/107/Rev.1. 
3 The programme for the Fifth Special Meeting on Procedures for Information Exchange is contained in 
G/TBT/GEN/59/Rev.1.  G/L/843 
Page 2  
 
  6. The Committee carried out, at its meeting of 9 November 2007, the Sixth Annual Transitional 
Review mandated in the Protocol of Accession of  the People's Republic of China (G/TBT/22). 
7. During the regular meetings of the TBT Comm ittee held in 2007, representatives of the 
Codex, IEC, ISO, ITC, OECD, OIML and UNIDO updated the Committee on activities relevant to the work of the TBT Committee, in cluding on technical assistance.  
 
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