"Technical trade barriers", also known as "technical trade measures" or "technical barriers", appear in the form of national or regional technical regulations, agreements, standards and certification systems (conformity assessment procedures), involving Its content is extensive, covering many technical indicator systems such as science and technology, health, quarantine, safety, environmental protection, product quality and certification. It is used in international trade and presents flexible and diverse regulations. Since a large number of such barriers appear in technical form, they are often disguised as legal and have become the most hidden and difficult to deal with non-tariff barriers in current international trade.
With the rise of economic globalization and the development of trade liberalization, coupled with the relevant restrictions of WTO rules, the types and forms of international trade barriers are constantly changing: tariff rates are getting lower and lower, traditional Non-tariff barriers are also gradually reduced, while new, more flexible and more covert trade barriers - technical trade barriers are constantly developing and their types are increasing. Our country has joined the World Trade Organization, so in international trade, we must act in accordance with WTO rules and relevant international practices. In the face of these new changes, how should we respond to technical trade barriers
so as to protect our country’s foreign trade interests in world trade and promote the healthy development of our economy and society in a more open environment? ? I think before proposing countermeasures, it is necessary to clarify the underlying reasons why technical trade barriers as a means of international trade protection are becoming more and more intense: (1) Protecting one's own country's interests is the fundamental purpose of all international relations. Although in order to promote the development of economic globalization and trade liberalization, countries committed to further reducing tariffs and gradually eliminating various non-tariff barriers while maintaining the status quo during the Uruguay Round negotiations. But now the international competition is becoming increasingly fierce. In order to safeguard their own trade interests, countries are gradually eliminating some traditional non-tariff barriers that are obviously contrary to the spirit of the WTO, and at the same time, they are constantly introducing more covert technical trade barriers. There are many names and more and more requirements. The more demanding. Technical trade barriers exist among developed countries, between developed countries and developing countries, and between developing countries. Just because the technical level of developing countries is far lower than that of developed countries, technical trade barriers have a greater impact on developing countries. (2) Many exceptions and loopholes in the WTO Agreement also provide legal basis for the implementation of technical barriers. As stipulated in the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade: “Any country may take necessary measures to protect the environment within the scope it deems appropriate, as long as these measures are not considered to cause any unreasonable discrimination between countries with equal conditions, or become a A means of concealing restrictions on international trade.” Another example is the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures, which states: “Parties have the right to adopt sanitary and phytosanitary measures for the protection of human, animal or plant life or health.” Parties “may implement or maintain measures that go above and beyond international standards, guidelines and recommendations” when they confirm that their measures are scientifically based and that the level of protection is appropriate. This means that the establishment of technical barriers to trade has great legitimacy. (3) The status of various countries and international environmental protection organizations is constantly improving, and their influence on government decision-making is increasing. Therefore, when governments implement relevant policies, they have to consider their voices, make concessions in relevant aspects, and increase trade barriers. As the global environment continues to deteriorate, it has attracted the attention of the international community. Since the 1970s, global environmental protection organizations have been established one after another. The more famous ones are Greenpeace, International Environmental Film and Television Group, World Wildlife Fund, etc. . They have branches in many countries and have many members. They carry out extensive environmental protection propaganda, strongly oppose various environmentally damaging behaviors of governments, and strongly demand governments to implement economic and social policies for sustainable development. Under the pressure of environmental protection organizations, the European Union has repeatedly raised environmental standards and requirements to reduce environmental pollution during the production process and increase the protection of human health and life.
(4) The concept of sustainable development is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, providing theoretical support for countries to implement technical trade barriers. As mentioned above, world environmental issues have attracted the attention of people and governments around the world, and sustainable development is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. Therefore, in order to gain a more favorable position in international trade, countries have gradually eliminated some non-tariff barriers that clearly violate the spirit of the WTO. At the same time, they have adopted the banner of sustainable development and increasingly turned to health and quarantine standards and environmental protection. Protect standards and other non-tariff barriers related to people's health and sustainable development. Because these measures are largely in line with the wishes of the general public (especially in developed countries). Therefore, countries are confident in implementing it, and the standards are becoming more and more stringent and there are more and more types. This is the main reason why technical trade barriers are becoming more and more serious.
Looking at the technical trade barriers in various countries around the world (mainly developed countries), the technical measures to restrict product imports mainly include the following types:
Strict and complicated technical regulations and technical standards
The use of technical standards as trade barriers is non-reciprocal and hidden. In international trade, developed countries are often the setters of international standards. Relying on their dominant position and technological advantages in world trade, they took the lead in formulating the rules of the game and forcing the implementation of technical standards based on their technical levels, leaving export manufacturers in economically backward countries far behind. Moreover, these technical standards and technical regulations often change, and some local governments have their own special regulations, which makes manufacturers in developing countries either unaware and at a loss what to do, or they pay higher costs to meet their standards, weakening the competitiveness of their products.
Complex conformity assessment procedures
As trade liberalization becomes a trend, quality certification and conformity assessment play an increasingly prominent role in improving export competitiveness and protecting the import market. Currently, the most widely used quality certification standards in the world are the ISO9000 series of standards. In addition, the United States, Japan, and the European Union have their own technical standard systems.
Strict packaging and labeling rules
In order to prevent packaging and its waste from posing a threat to the ecological environment and the safety of humans, animals and plants, many countries have promulgated a series of packaging and labeling regulations laws and regulations to protect consumer rights and the ecological environment. From the perspective of protecting the environment and saving energy, the packaging system does have a positive effect, but it increases the costs for exporters, and technical requirements vary from country to country and are constantly changing, often forcing foreign exporters to constantly change packaging and losing many trade opportunities.
Edit the impact and role of this paragraph
Overview
It can be seen that technical barriers to trade have many objective living environments. In today's international trade, technical trade barriers are not only inevitable, but will exist for a long time. Its impact on international trade will be increasingly greater. At the same time, it will also play a very important role in the development of society. According to statistics from the State Intellectual Property Office, 80% of current world trade barriers come from technical trade barriers.
Negative Impact
1. More and more technical trade barriers (such as national standards and regulations, technical regulations, conformity assessment procedures, etc.) hinder the free development of international trade and cannot It is conducive to the free circulation and optimal allocation of world resources, and runs counter to the social development trend of economic globalization and trade liberalization. This is the main basis for trade liberalism to oppose technical trade barriers. For example, most electronic and electrical products are required to comply with the standards of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC), Underwriters Laboratories (UL) and other relevant agencies; the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requires textiles to be marked with ingredient and protective labels, and consumers The Committee on Safety (CPSC) requires the fire resistance of textiles to meet relevant standards; the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is responsible for the management and monitoring of imported foods, drugs, health products, cosmetics, detergents, and medical equipment, as well as the purity and labeling of goods. Strict requirements include random inspections when goods enter the country; the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) also requires pork and poultry to undergo strict disinfection procedures.
These series of standard requirements and testing measures will undoubtedly bring a lot of inconvenience to international trade and increase the cost of imported goods. 2. Over a long period of time, the distribution of international trade benefits will further tilt towards developed countries. In the current international standards system, standard setters are basically developed countries, while developing countries are mostly passive recipients of standards. The standards set by developed countries based on their own interests and technological level are difficult for many developing countries to meet. Therefore, developed countries often use technical standards to set up trade barriers or even launch technical trade wars to protect their international trade interests, thereby continuing to control developing countries and occupy a dominant position in international trade. For example, my country's frozen chickens have been banned by the European Union since August 1996 on the grounds that they have not passed quarantine. It was not until May 2001 that the ban was lifted on 14 companies in several areas of Shanghai and Shandong, resulting in annual losses of nearly 100 million U.S. dollars; from July 2001 Starting from March, the European Union has made new regulations on imported tea. The maximum allowable pesticide residues in some products are only 1/100-1/200 of the original standards (in fact, tea produced according to the original standards is no longer harmful to the human body), such as If effective measures are not taken, our country's tea will be forced to withdraw from the EU market. According to relevant reports, my country's export reduction in 1999 due to foreign technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment procedures alone amounted to at least US$50 billion. Nowadays, "technical standards trade wars" often occur among developed countries. They are nominally to protect the three major structural changes in my country's foreign trade
the environment or people's health and life safety, but in fact, Its larger purpose is to enable domestic traders to gain more benefits from international trade. According to other statistics, in key technical fields such as life sciences and biotechnology, information technology, and new materials, the number of patents owned by Western developed countries accounts for about 90% of the total global patents, while developing countries including China The state owns only about 10%. Such a large technological gap cannot be narrowed in the short term. Therefore, for a long time, developing countries will be in an increasingly disadvantaged position in the international trade pattern.
Positive effects
1. Environmental barriers and green standards objectively promote the implementation of sustainable development. Economic construction and environmental protection are a pair of contradictions that any country will encounter in the development process. However, immediate economic benefits often lead people to choose the path of destroying the environment for economic construction. Especially in some developing countries, due to limited funds, they are simply unable to take environmental protection into account. The practice of destroying forests for hunting and depleting lakes for fishing has drastically deteriorated the earth's environment. Even in our country, although environmental protection has long been regarded as a basic national policy, according to incomplete statistics, the national export value of products affecting the ecological environment reached 8.6 billion US dollars in 1998, accounting for 6.2% of the total exports that year; in 2000, the products with higher pollution Exports (such as dyes, leather products, printing and dyeing products, pulp, etc.) reached US$11 billion, accounting for 5.1% of the year's exports. The implementation of green standards will force Chinese companies to reduce environmental pollution during the production process and adopt green production systems to produce green products. This will objectively promote the implementation of my country's sustainable development strategy. Similarly, to a certain extent, it will also promote the development of the world economy and the protection of the world environment to be coordinated and balanced, which is conducive to protecting the ecological environment of the entire earth while developing the world economy. 2. Continuously improving quarantine standards and packaging design standards encourage countries to continuously improve the quality, hygiene and safety performance of their own products, which has a positive effect on human life safety and health. Especially now that animal and plant epidemics (such as foot-and-mouth disease, mad cow disease, wheat dwarf smut, corn bacterial wilt, etc.) occur from time to time in various countries around the world, and the safety of genetically modified products (GMO) still cannot be scientifically determined, so In international trade, it is very necessary for countries to formulate relevant quarantine standards and strictly implement them.
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For English translation, you can find someone from a local English newspaper or magazine, or you can go to Google Translate and spend some money to find someone. Translation·· Answered by: lixiang628 | Level 5 | 2011-4-4 00:22
Textiles are one of the pillar products of my country's exports. According to the agreement reached with all parties when China entered the WTO, countries around the world will cancel textile export quota restrictions in 2005. This is good news for my country's textile enterprises. Foreign trade professionals also expect that textile exports will become the engine driving my country's foreign trade exports. , China's foreign trade will still maintain a high growth rate. But in fact, textile exports are not optimistic. Developed countries use technical trade barriers, which mainly include technical regulations, technical standards, conformity assessment procedures and health and quarantine measures, to control the export speed and scale of my country's textile products. According to statistics, 60% of my country's export companies have encountered foreign technical trade barriers, and about 45-50 billion US dollars of export products are affected every year, of which nearly 8 billion US dollars are affected by textiles. Therefore, there is an urgent need to analyze the current implementation and development status of technical trade barriers in international trade, study the actual situation of technical trade barriers encountered in my country's foreign trade, and formulate effective policy measures to overcome the obstacles caused by technical trade barriers.
Textiles are the backbone of our export products. According to China in the WTO with the parties to the agreement reached in 2005, the world will cancel the export quota restrictions on China's textile enterprises, is good news, people also expect foreign trade export will become the engine of China's export trade, China's foreign trade will remain relatively high growth rates. But in fact, textile exports but not optimistic, developed countries with technical regulations, technical standards, conformity assessment procedures, and sanitary and phytosanitary measures as the main content of the technical barriers to control the export of Chinese textile products speed and scale. According to statistics, China and 60 of foreign exporters of technical trade barriers, each year about 450-500 billion of exports affected, of which , the impact of textiles in nearly 80 million us. dollars. Therefore, an urgent need to analyze the current international trade technical barriers to the implementation and development of China's foreign trade technical barriers encountered in the actual situation, develop effective policies and measures, technical barriers to trade the formation of the disorder.
Since the 2008 financial crisis, the international trade of agricultural products has been increasingly affected. The exports of agricultural products from developing countries have dropped significantly, the deficit has been expanding, the prices of agricultural products have been running at low levels, and demand has shrunk. , the contradiction between production and marketing is prominent, and trade protectionism is on the rise. As a major agricultural province in China, how Liaoning Province can actively respond to this crisis and challenge and maintain the good development of Liaoning Province's agricultural export trade has become an issue that people have to pay attention to.
At present, there are still many problems in the export trade of agricultural products in Liaoning Province, which hinder and restrict the further improvement and development of agricultural export trade. This article starts from the basic situation of Liaoning Province's agricultural products export, focuses on analyzing the basic situation and problems of Liaoning Province's agricultural products export trade in the post-financial crisis era, and on this basis proposes development strategies for Liaoning Province's agricultural products export trade, and looks forward to the future development of Liaoning Province's agricultural products. A bright future.
The main framework of this article consists of the following three parts:
1. The basic situation and characteristics of the development of agricultural export trade in Liaoning Province in the post-financial crisis era. Use data to illustrate the export trade situation of Liaoning Province's agricultural products, main export crops and international market conditions in 2009, and analyze the comparative advantages of Liaoning Province's agricultural exports
2. Problems existing in Liaoning Province's agricultural exports in the post-financial crisis era . It mainly analyzes the problems existing in the added value of exported agricultural products, quality and safety, trade barriers, export markets and policies.
3. Countermeasures to promote the development of agricultural export trade in Liaoning Province in the post-financial crisis era. Countermeasures and suggestions are put forward one by one to solve the problems existing in the export of agricultural products in Liaoning Province.
4. Prospects for export trade of agricultural products in Liaoning Province.
Since 2008, since the financial crisis of international trade has increasingly seriously affected, developing countries agricultural exports have decreased dramatically, deficit continues to expand, agricultural prices, low operation demand contradiction, production, trade protectionism growth. As a big agricultural province of liaoning province of China, such as what positive response to the crisis and challenge, keep the export trade in liaoning agricultural development, has become a concern of the people. At present, liaoning agricultural exports still exist many problems, and restrict the agricultural product export trade further improvement and development. From liaoning agricultural exports of basic conditions, and emphatically analyze the financial crisis in liaoning agricultural era after the basic situation and the export trade, and based on the development of agricultural product export trade in liaoning province of liaoning province, countermeasures for future development of agricultural products.
The framework consists of three main parts:
After the financial crisis and the background in liaoning agricultural product export trade development situation and characteristics of basic. In data 2009 liaoning agricultural product export trade, mainly export crops and international market conditions, analysis of liaoning agricultural exports of comparative advant
age
Second, after the financial crisis background liaoning agricultural product export problems. Mainly analyzes the quality and safety of agricultural products export value, and barriers to trade and export market and the problems existing in the policy.
p>After the financial crisis and promote liaoning agricultural product export trade era development countermeasure. In liaoning agricultural product export problems existing in them to propose the countermeasure and the suggestion.
Four, liaoning agricultural product export trade prospect.