The second chapter in McGraw-Hill Education’s international marketing textbook, The Dynamic Environment of International Trade, states that at no time in modern economic history have countries been more economically interdependent, had greater opportunities for international trade, or had greater potential for increased demand than now.

Yet the unspoken rule in international trade is that competition should be fair, which, to me, implies that all existing or proposed barriers or impediments to international trade should be known and visible. For its part, the World Fair Trade Organisation (WFTO), established in 1964, prescribes ten principles of fair trade.

The World Trade Organisation (WTO), established on January 1, 1995, describes itself as the only global international organisation dealing with the rules of trade between nations. At its heart are the WTO agreements, negotiated and signed by the majority of the world’s trading nations and ratified in their Parliaments.

One of the agreements that the WTO adminis- ters is the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Agreement, which entered into force with the establishment of the WTO. The TBT Agreement is closely aligned to the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS) Agreement, which has similar goals. In essence, the TBT is aimed at ensuring that technical regulations, standards, testing and certification procedures do not create unnecessary obstacles to trade. As a consequence, it prohibits technical requirements created to limit trade, as opposed to technical requirements created for legitimate purposes, such as consumer or environmental protection.

The TBT Agreement has a transparency obligation that requires WTO member countries to publish and notify the WTO, which, in turn, notifies its member countries, of any draft technical regulations at least 60 days in advance of adoption.

In South Africa, the South African Bureau of Standards (SABS) serves as the notification point – the South African TBT Enquiry Point – providing a weekly ‘early warning system for WTO/TBT notifications’ email, which contains notifications of proposed technical regulations for a specific week. The email urges recipients to read the notifications relating to their specific area of trade and to provide comment on the draft technical regulations within five working days.

The notification is extremely user-friendly, with the proposed TBT measure covering six information fields, namely notification ID, country, subject, title, date and view notification. The last feature is particularly helpful, as it provides a link on which a user simply clicks. The official WTO notification – Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade – then opens, providing the user with the information he or she requires. As an example, in the ‘early warning system for WTO/TBT’ notification for the week October 13 to 19 featured 29 proposed TBT measures, with only one relating to the European Union (EU). It read: “Notification ID – 14-5876; Country – EU; Subject – Marine Equipment; Title – Committee on Technical Barriers to Trade – Notification – European Union – Marine equipment; Date – 2014/10/14; and View Notification – docsGTBTN14EU246.doc.”

The WTO notification is normally published in English, one of the WTO official languages, and circulated in accordance with Article 10.6 of the TBT Agreement, which states: “The secre- tariat shall, when it receives notifications in accordance with the provisions of this agreement, circulate copies of the notifications to all members and interested international standardising and conformity assessment bodies and draw the attention of developing-country members to any notifications relating to products of particular interest to them.”

The WTO notification contains the following information: “notification member; agency responsible; notified under article; products covered (Harmonised System or Customs Commodity Code number, where applicable, otherwise national tariff heading. International classification for standards numbers may be provided in addition, where applicable); title, number of pages and language(s) of the notified document; description of content; objective and rationale, including the nature of urgent problems where applicable; relevant documents; proposed date of adoption and proposed date of entry into force; final date for comments; and text available from – National enquiry point.”

Should you be interested in receiving the weekly notification, contact Ronel Greyvenstein, WTO/TBT enquiry officer at the SABS, at ronel.greyvenstein@sabs.co.za.

Plant Health Policy
The Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) has released its ‘Plant Health (Phytosanitary) Policy for South Africa – May 2014’, dated October 17, through a Government Gazette notice. According to the notice, plants are capable of harbouring potentially damaging pests, and a plant pest is defined by the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) as any species, strain or biotype of plant, animal or pathogenic agent injurious to plants or plant products.

South Africa is a signatory to the SPS Agree- ment and the IPPC Agreement, which pertain to the rights and obligations embodied in the respective agreements and the national capaci- ties that should be in place for South Africa to meet its obligations and thus fully realise the benefits under these agreements. The SPS Agreement is, in essence, an agreement on how governments can apply food safety and animal and plant health measures. The DAFF policy relates to phytosanitary, and not sanitary. It is understood that, in South Africa’s instance, sanitary measures are not solely confined to the authority of the DAFF, transcending many government departments and agencies. As a consequence, it is not known if a single sanitary policy will follow.

The policy indicates that, as a signatory, South Africa is obliged to apply harmonised standards to facilitate safe, fair and free trade. South Africa, therefore, applies the principles set out in the IPPC’s International Standards for Phytosanitary Measures (ISPMs). It is understood that the intention of the ISPMs is to harmonise phytosanitary measures applied in international trade in order to assist countries in attaining equal market access and simultaneously protect plant health within their territories with minimum disruption to international trade and travel. These principles are also applied on a regional level, where the Southern African Development Community Protocol on Trade constitutes the framework for cooperation in SPS matters.

The DAFF policy seeks to address gaps and challenges in the current phytosanitary system in accordance with the requirements of South Africa’s major trading partners and the requirements under the relevant international agreements and treaties to which South Africa is a signatory member.

Customs Control Act Rules
The South African Revenue Service has released the third batch of draft rules of the Customs Control Act, No 31, of 2014, assented to on July 21, for comment by November 14.