Standards and conformity assessment as nontariff barriers to trade

Sherry M. Stephenson

No 1826, Policy Research Working Paper Series from The World Bank

Abstract: As traditional barriers to trade have fallen, standards, technical regulations, and procedures for assessing conformity have become increasingly important as nontariff barriers to trade. But relatively little is known about the extent and nature of those barriers and even less about their quantitative impact, especially in developing countries. To facilitate trade, regional initiatives on standards and conformity assessment appear to be more promising than a multilateral approach because of the greater trust and commonality of interest at the regional level -especially with regard to mutual recognition agreements. For reasons of both efficiency and cost, developing countries should adopt the standards of their major trading partners rather than develop their own national standards. Developing countries have not been heavily involved in developing international and regional standards; they have been on the sidelines in efforts to rationalize this process. To have greater influence on the development of standards, they should take a more proactive approach to these issues in the International Organization for Standardization, the International Electrical Commission, and related regional and multilateral bodies.

Keywords: Environmental Economics&Policies; Health Economics&Finance; Scientific Research&Science Parks; Labor Policies; Administrative&Regulatory Law; Environmental Economics&Policies; Trade and Regional Integration; Health Economics&Finance; Scientific Research&Science Parks; Science Education (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1997-09-30
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

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