WORLD TRADE  
ORGANIZATION  G/SPS/GEN/1053 
18 October 2010 
 (10-5375) 
Committee on Sanitary a nd Phytosanitary Measures Original:   English 
  
 
INFORMATION ON SPS-RELATED RECENT AND FORTHCOMING  
ASSISTANCE AND OTHER ACTIVITIES 
(PERIOD:  JUNE-OCTOBER 2010) 
 
Communication from the International Trade Center (ITC)
 
 
  The following communication, received on 15 Octo ber 2010, is being circulated at the request 
of the ITC
. 
 
_______________ 
 
 A. P
ROJECTS  
STDF/PG/172:  "Expanding Nigeria’s export of sesame seeds and sheanut/butter through 
improved SPS capacity building for private and public sector" 
 
1. The Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) is the implementing agency of the project, 
with ITC as supervisory agency.  The contract be tween WTO and NEPC and the letter of Agreement 
between ITC and WTO have been signed.  The project start-up meeting in Nigeria took place on 14 October 2010.  The official launch of the project is foreseen in December 2010.  
All ACP Agricultural Commodities Programme 
 
2. ITC has been selected to play a leading role in a Programme, funded by the European 
Commission, that targets agricultural commodity  sectors in ACP countries.  The Programme was 
conceived by ACP member states.  Its overall objec tive is to improve incomes and livelihoods for 
ACP producers of agricultural commodities and reduce income vulnerability at both producer and 
macro levels.  
3. Under the Programme ITC is respons ible for two main activities:  
• Support to sector stakeholders to design and organise the implementation of commodity 
development and diversification stra tegies using ITC methodologies;  and 
• Implementation of sector strategy activities in product and market devel opment, particularly 
in the areas of target market supply require ments, delivery channels, and product/service 
improvements. 
 
4. Other implementing partners in the Programme  include:  the Common Fund for Commodities 
(CFC), the Food and Agriculture Organization of  the United Nations (FAO), the United Nations 
Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), and the World Bank (WB). G/SPS/GEN/1053 
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  5. In Samoa, assistance is being provided for the establishment of ISO 22000 food safety 
management systems in six enterpri ses in the food and agricultural sector.  This is being done through 
workshops on: 
• Implementing Food Safety Management Systems – ISO 22000; 
• Documentation for ISO 22000; 
• Hazard Analysis and Categori zation of Control Measures; 
• Internal Audit; 
and advisory services to the enterpri ses with the help of an internati onal consultant and several local 
trainers-cum-counsellors (TcC) to ensure sustainabi lity after the project with capacity building of 
these TcCs.  This activity started with a needs assessment in August 201 0 and will continue until 
December 2011.  B. O
THER ITC  PROJECTS OF INTEREST  
Non-Tariff Measures project 
 
6. ITC assists countries to better understand the obst acles to trade experienced by their business 
sectors when complying with non-tariff measures (N TM).  In this regard, ITC implemented a 
company survey on NTMs in 2010 in Sri Lanka.  The Sri Lankan survey identified, at sector and partner country-level, the predominant obstacles the business sector faces when complying with 
NTMs.  
7. ITC is organizing a one-day workshop in Colombo (22 November 2010), in close 
collaboration with its partners, to discuss the su rvey results with key stakeholders, including 
representatives of various Ministries, the privat e sector, trade support institutions, government 
agencies, and academics.  The aim is to to provide an in-depth analysis of the survey results, which 
will help identify the need for concrete actions  in key export and import sectors of Sri Lanka.  
8. An ITC presentation on NTMs was given at the STDF Working Group Meeting on 2 July 
2010 on an information sharing basis. 
For more information about NTM project, please contact: 
Ms Poonam Mohun, ITC, NTM Market Analyst, Market Analysis and Research Tel:  +41 22 730 0277;  Fax:  +41 22 730 0577;  E-mail:  mohun@intracen.org
 
 
Trade for Sustainable Development (T4SD) 
 
9. ITC continues its work in Trade for Sustaina ble Development (T4SD), a partnership-based 
effort led by the ITC to enhance transparency on private standards and to increase opportunities for 
sustainable production and trade.  In July, T4SD launched the Standards Map beta web tool that 
centralises information on private standards and ma kes the data widely accessible to various target 
audiences, namely suppliers from developing countri es, trade policymakers, and intermediate private 
or public buyers.  The live version of the St andards Map will be launc hed in January 2011. 
For more information about T4SD, please c ontact Joseph Wozniak, Programme Manager 
(wozniak@intracen.org ). 
 
ACCESS! Programme 
 
10. The ACCESS! Programme, initiated under the Canadian-funded Programme, is a gender-
focused, regional trade support programme aimed at  improving the trade support services for African  G/SPS/GEN/1053 
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  businesswomen in international trade, with a view  to promoting their economic empowerment.  Three 
ACCESS training of trainer events have ta ken place:  Senegal (9-17 June 2010), Gabon  
(14-22 July 2010), and Zambia ( 29 September – 7 October 2010).  
11. Fifty-six national trainers have been trained to deliver the export training course to women 
entrepreneurs, 22 institutions from 21 countries are or will become partners of the ACCESS! 
programme towards its national delivery. 
C. ITC  INTERNATIONAL TRADE FORUM MAGAZINE  
Issue 3, 2010 Quality & Standards:  A Pre-requisite for Entering Markets 
 
12. The Quality & Standards magazine issue look at  standards and quality and their role for the 
promotion of exports from developing countries.  The issue has been published in September 2010.  
Article contributions, inter alia, from STDF, WT O SPS Committee secretariat, ISO, IEC, OIML, 
UNIDO GAP Inc and FairTrade International are ve ry well acknowledged.  The online version is 
available at http://www.tradeforum.org . 
D. WORLD EXPORT DEVELOPMENT FORUM – ADAPTING POST CRISIS WORLD TRADE PATTERNS 
AND LESSONS FROM EXPORT DEVELOPMENT , 9-12  SEPTEMBER 2010 
13. ITC organized, with the Ministry of Comme rce of China, the China Council for the 
Promotion of International Trade and the City of  Chongqing, the 4th municipality of China, the 11th 
World Export Development Forum (WEDF).  The Forum looked at the strategies employed by companies, trade support institutions and policy makers  to mitigate the negative impacts of the crisis, 
by building company resilience through the diversif ication of markets and product as well as service 
development strategies.  Information on WEDF is available at:  http://www.intracen.org/wedf/welcome.htm
 
E. PUBLICATION AND EXPORT QUALITY (EQ)  BULLETINS  
EQ 84 "Exporting Seafood to EU" in Arabic 
 
14. The Arabic version of the ITC bulletin EQ 84 "Exporting Seafood to EU" is available and 
downloadable from http://www.intracen.org/eqm/  (click on "Handbooks and Bulletins").  The 
translation has been done under a joint publicati on agreement between the Yemeni Seafood Exporters 
Association (YSEA, the implementing agency of ST DF project 69) and INFOSAMAK.  The bulletin 
is under distribution to Competent Authorities and exporters in the Arab region.  
"Building Linkages for Export Success - Trad e Promotion Organizations and National 
Standards Bodies Working Together" 
 15. To explore how collaboration between Trade Promotion Organizations (TPO) and National 
Standards Bodies (NSB) could be achieved, ISO and ITC jointly organized a regional consultation on 
"Quality Management:  Linking TPOs and NSBs fo r Export Success" in Malaysia in December 2009, 
partly funded by the Swedish International De velopment Cooperation Agency (SIDA).  As an 
outcome of the consultation, ITC and ISO have published a handbook that captures the highlights of 
the forum discussions and provides additional information where relevant.  The handbook was 
designed for those in NSBs, TPOs and government agencies supporting international trade to show 
the advantages of closer collaboration to assist ex porters.  The examples given are drawn from the 
shared experiences of participants, and can be used  by developing economies in all regions to review 
local situations.  The handbook is downloadable from http://www.intracen.org/eqm/events/
 in English 
and Spanish and will be available in French by the end of October 2010.  G/SPS/GEN/1053 
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  16. Following the successful event in Malaysia a nd the related ITC-ISO handbook on "Building 
Linkages for Export Success", ITC and ISO decided to  roll out the initiative to other regions.  The 
next event on "Linking TPOs and NSBs for E xport Success" will be hosted by the Oficina Nacional 
de Normalizacion (NC) in Havana and organised  with the support of CEPEC (Foreign Trade 
Promotion Center of Cuba) on 24-26 November 2010. 
 
    
For more information: 
Shyam K. Gujadhur, ITC Senior Adviser on Standards and Quality Management 
Tel:  +41 22 730 03 96;  Fax:  +41 22 730 05 76;  E-mail: gujadhur@intracen.org
 
 Ludovica Ghizzoni, ITC Adviser on Enterprise Value Chain –Export Quality Management  
Tel:  +41 22 730 06 38;  Fax:  +41 22 730 05 76;  E-mail: ghizzoni@intracen.org
 
 Web address:  http://www.intracen.org/eqm
 
E-mail address:  quality@intracen.org 
 
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