Introduction

During the Uruguay Round of world trade negotiations, the significance of SPS measures was recognised and a set of rules and committee was established as part of the WTO.  The Agreement on Sanitary and Phyto-sanitary measures oversees the application of such measures on traded goods. 

This Watching Brief outlines some of the recent policy developments relating to SPS measures, highlighting those issues of particular significance to trade in forest products.

Here we focus on three policy issues:

a) import regulations imposed by national governments and regional trading areas and the process by which they are developed;

b) constraints faced by exporting countries to abide by the import regulations; and 

c) Initiatives to build up the capacity of developing countries to participate in standard development meet standards and also challenge them, with a view to increasing market access.