Investigación económica y análisis de políticas comerciales
Filter :
The Benefits Of Taking Part
Part I described the system of food standards and trade rules created by members for members. With such a system in place what is then required to keep it working and fit for purpose? And how can members take advantage of the benefits it has to offer?
A Dynamic System
Methods of production and processing as well as the paths that food travels along from farm to fork are continuously evolving. The standards world must be ready to adjust to ensure that food trade can continue to flow smoothly. Stakeholders will need to be prepared able to pick up the signals that change is taking place and to steer their national frameworks accordingly.
The ITA and the international digital economy
Over the past 20 years the ITA has led to the wider use of new technology by cutting the costs of key ICT goods. The ITA expansion further opens up trade on 201 new-generation IT products and technology.
Executive summary
This publication explains how international food safety standards are set through the Joint Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and World Health Organization (FAO/WHO) Food Standards Programme – the Codex Alimentarius Commission – and how these standards are applied in the context of the World Trade Organization (WTO) Agreements on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS Agreement) and on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT Agreement).
Introduction
The annual value of trade in agricultural products has grown almost three-fold over the past decade largely in emerging economies and developing countries reaching USD 1.7 trillion. Over the past two decades the reduction in tariffs through global and regional trade agreements has provided greater opportunities for the expansion of global food trade. However in order to trade internationally and access markets for high-value products producers must be able to meet food standards. Governments apply food standards to ensure that food is safe and meets quality and labelling requirements. The use of international food standards worldwide helps reduce trade costs by making trade more transparent and efficient allowing food to move more smoothly between markets.
The Institutional Framework
Trade can be more complicated than we think. What happens when two countries define the same product differently or if they set out different criteria to check that a product is safe? Let us think for example of the inconvenience as a traveller in havin 15 different types of electrical outlet plugs in the world or the enormous infrastructure investment required for train cargo and passengers to travel across the border between two countries that have different track gauge. Then consider the benefits of being able to plug in and use a USB key with any computer worldwide or the advantages of standard cables standard operating systems or the standard size of a credit card.
Acknowledgements
This publication Trade and Food Standards has been jointly prepared by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Trade Organization (WTO).
Trade and Food Standards
Co-published by the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
Foreword
Trade in food is difficult to imagine without standards. Food standards give confidence to consumers in the safety quality and authenticity of what they eat. By setting down a common understanding on different aspects of food for consumers producers and governments standards enable trade to take place. If every government applies different food standards trade is more costly and it is more difficult to ensure that food is safe and meets consumers' expectations.
Trade, Technology, and Prosperity
Trade and technological change continually alter the workplace and labor-market outcomes with consequences for economy-wide welfare and the distribution of real incomes.
When Bad Trade Policy Costs Human Lives
Many developing countries still levy tariffs on mosquito nets thereby discouraging their use and contributing to the spread of diseases such as malaria and dengue. Focusing on sub-Saharan Africa the paper shows to which extent such tariffs are in place and based on existing elasticity figures calculates the cost of this policy.
Conclusions
Economic progress involves economic disruption and there has always been an inherent and unavoidable trade-off between the benefits of growth on the one hand and the cost of adjustment on the other. Today is no exception. The expansion of the global economy – spurred by technological advances and market opening – is enhancing the welfare and improving the living conditions of billions of people around the world. But it is also resulting in economic change displacement and disruption – creating enormous pressure for individuals and societies to adjust and adapt if they are to keep up with and share in the benefits of economic progress.
Policy responses to labour market adjustment and distributional changes
If the economy is to benefit from technological change and trade workers will often have to change jobs or occupations a process which may cause dislocation for workers. The more smoothly this process takes place in the labour market the lower the adjustment costs for displaced workers and the greater the net gains to society from technological change and trade. Governments and other institutions can make the labour market more responsive to economic change through a range of measures that are targeted primarily at but not focused exclusively on the labour market. Reducing the costs of adjustment for workers can also lower public resistance to technological change and prevent the rise of trade protectionism.