WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SPS/GEN/152
7 December 1999
(99-5387)
Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Original:  English
VOLUNTARY TRANSPARENCY
Full Texts, Translations, Comments
Thoughts from the United States SPS Enquiry Point / Notification Authority
 at the Special Meeting of the SPS Committee on Transparency Provisions
held on 9 November 1999
1. Members agree to basic transparency through obligatory notifications.  Notification occurs at
an early enough stage so that other Members' comments can, as appropriate, lead to meaningful
changes. Time constraints are very important in th is process.  Information is increasingly available
and shared electronically.  Additional voluntary sharing of information occurs, but not systematically
nor equally.
2. The WTO Secretariat must not be unduly burdened with voluntary notifications.  Current
technology, however, enables Member-based, voluntary sharing initiatives, which the Secretariat
could perform with minimal effort.
3. Members have unequal equal access to the world wide web.  The Committee could consider
how Members not currently enjoying full transparency benefits can do so and to what extent
additional voluntary procedures may assist, in particular, developing Members in this regard.
Focusing technical assistance towards ensuring adequate internet access for obligatory and voluntary
transparency could be effective capacity building for developing countries.
4. Full texts :  Currently Members request full texts (and supporting documents) from a
notifying Member. If a notifying Member voluntarily publishes the full texts and relevant documents
on their home web page, other Members can easily and quickly obtain these with less effort for all
parties.  The key is knowing when and where others' full texts are available.
5. Translations :  Members may wish to publish full text translations in other languages for
better understanding. Mostly, however, other Me mbers translate for their own use a notifying
Member's full text.  Translation sharing currently occurs, but not equally.  Systematic, voluntary
posting of translations could build better understanding for broader audiences, especially for
developing countries with limited resources to translate documents.
6. Comments :  Members may publish their comments regarding another Member's proposed
measure.  Comments are now shared, but not equally.  Systematic, voluntary posting of comments
could build better analysis capacities, especially for developing countries with limited resources.G/SPS/GEN/152
Page 2
7.  A key is knowing who on a voluntary basis ma kes what available, when, about what.  One
solution is systematically maintaining one web site to list all available ( required and voluntary )
information relative to SPS notifications.  If maintained by the SPS Secretariat, substantive voluntary
information would NOT reside on the Secretariat's home page, rather such would be maintained by
Members on their own home pages.  The Secretariat would systematically provide a "hot link" on its
Document Dissemination home page as per a Memb er's voluntary notification.  The WTO Document
Dissemination site would simply note that a Member is volunteering information related to a
notification and by clicking on this would activate th e hot link to this additional voluntary information
on the volunteering Member's web site.  Distinctions could be made using extensions such as FT (full
text), TRN (translation) and COM (comment).  Thr ee examples of how voluntary notifications could
be constructed are provided below.G/SPS/GEN/152
Page 3
WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SPS/N/USA/N/500.FT
01 January 2000
(99-0000)
Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Original:  English
Availability of United States' FULL TEXT
G/SPS/N/USA/500
Location of Translated Full Text: http://www.USDA.gov/WTO/SPS/500FT.htm
WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SPS/N/MEX/400.TRN
01 January 2000
(99-0000)
Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Original:  English
Availability of United States' informal TRANSLATION into English
of the Full Text associated with G/SPS/N/MEX/400
Location of Full Text Translation: http://www.USDA.gov/WTO/SPS/MEX/400TRN.htm
WORLD TRADE
ORGANIZATIONG/SPS/N/MEX/300.COM
01 January 2000
(99-0000)
Committee on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures Original:  English
United States COMMENTS
on Mexico's G/SPS/N/MEX/300
Location of Comments: http://www.USDA.gov/WT O/SPS/MEX/300COM.htm
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