Regional Integration and TCB

Developing the full set of standards and conformity assessment infrastructure needed to help exporters satisfy international requirements and governments to fulfill their duties...

... outlined by the TBT and SPS agreements – standards, testing, calibration, legal metrology, certification, accreditation, inspection, traceability – in a developing country is a high cost venture. In this context, a regional approach to trade capacity building has several advantages.

Practical experience has led UNIDO to realize that addressing trade capacity issues at the sub-regional level stimulates greater market integration and can result in penetration of global markets possibly beyond the reach of individual countries. Sub-regional projects can also be more cost effective – one common accreditation body may, for example, be sufficient for a group of countries.

As a consequence of proliferating regional economic cooperation and trade agreements, harmonization of standards and conformity assessment procedures have indeed become a necessity. In this process, regional programmes can also help developing countries to prepare a common position in trade negotiations and to voice their needs in standardization and conformity assessment effectively.

UNIDO has years of accumulated experience in building and strengthening the capacity of regional organisations (e.g. UEMOA, ECOWAS, SAARC, Mekong, EAC, Andean Community and Central America) in this area in addition to providing assistance at the national level.