Regulatory convergence through the WTO

Regulatory measures have emerged as the most important source of impediments to international trade and investment. The session examined the key challenges posed by differences in regulations, and reviewed the various approaches pursued by countries to cooperate internationally to address such challenges. Since regulatory objectives in different countries are often very similar, such as ensuring health and safety or minimising risk, international regulatory cooperation can indeed serve as a powerful instrument to lower trade costs and reduce market segmenting without undercutting the attainment of regulatory objectives.

Experts from the E15 task force on Regulatory Coherence explained why the WTO needs to do more in this area, and discussed how it can do so, through concrete policy recommendations that serve to improve regulatory outcomes while decreasing the trade-reducing impacts of regulatory differences.

Building on ICTSD’s twenty-year history of encouraging innovative thinking on trade and sustainable development issues at WTO Ministerial Conferences, 2015’s Trade and Development Symposium (TDS) acted as a crucial platform for intellectual enquiry and dialogue on the future of the multilateral trading system. The E15Initiative stream at the Trade and Development Symposium focused on dialogue around the key deliverables the Initiative’s world class experts released in January 2016 at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Discussions provided an exclusive preview of the policy options that have been developed over four years by some of the world’s most pre-eminent trade policy experts.