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Influence of Trade Regimes and Agreements on AKST | 73
Table 3-2. Classification of Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT).
Criteria of Classification |
Types of Barriers |
Policy instrument |
• Import bans—total and partial |
Scope |
• Uniform —both for domestic production and imports |
Regulatory goal |
• Producer/processor interest—commercial animal and plant health protection, compatibility |
were implemented through process and product standards mainly in the case of food safety and total and partial bans and process and product standards in the case of animal and plant health protection. On the other hand, non-risk reducing measures were few and mainly with respect to quality attributes. Many countries use very blunt instruments such as import bans that excessively restrict imports well beyond what is necessary for protecting the health of their people, plants or animals. The level of protection involved in some cases is equivalent to tariffs of more than 10% (Hoekman and Anderson, 1999). An analysis of technical barriers to US agricultural exports in 1996 showed that: The WTO agreement on TBT sets standards for labeling and packaging of agricultural products as recommended by the Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC). The CAC, on which both the TBT and the SPS measures agreements of WTO are based, was established by FAO and WHO in 1962 which recommends food safety and labeling standards. In |
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the 1980s, the CAC came out with general labeling standards and nutritional labeling standards. After this in the Tokyo round of GATT, an agreement on technical barriers to trade was negotiated. The TBT agreement which has been now signed by all the WTO members is applicable to all products including agricultural goods and food but its provisions do not apply to SPS measures (Swinbank, 1999). The TBT agreement covers labeling of food, quality requirement for fresh food products, packaging requirements and labeling of textiles in the agrofood sector (Chawla and Kumar, 1997). Although the public debate on the use of technical barriers to trade has focused on use of these measures to protect consumer and the environment interest, a large number of these measures actually protect the commercial interest of producers by reducing the probability of biological risks to crops and livestock (Roberts, 1999). There is no doubt that TBT will remain an important issue in international regulatory and trade policy forums for the foreseeable future. 3.2.4 Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) measures and AKST |
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