National SpS Coordination Mechanisms - Standards and Trade ...

countries with a cross-cutting national SPS committee (as opposed to mechanisms focusing onspecific sub-areas or export sectors), only four are formal in nature. 1024. The majority of respondents considered that national SPS committees should be formalin nature, as this would assist to define roles, mandates and membership, and to securefunding. While formal recognition may be preferable, it is not uncommon for the achievementof this status to take several years. There are also numerous examples of informal mechanismsthat have been successful in achieving their objectives. These include ad hoc coordinatingcommittees that have come to life in emergency situations, such as outbreaks of plant pests andanimal diseases (see Figure 4 below), as well as examples of public-private coordination inspecific export sectors. Moreover, as highlighted below in sub-section 2.5, funding needs forthe establishment and operation of national SPS committees appear to be modest. In short, theinformal nature of a national SPS committee should not be used by countries as an excuse toput coordination and information sharing "on hold".Figure 4: Legal status of SPS coordination mechanisms in Africa25. In the survey, ten countries indicated the existence of terms of reference to guide theoperations of their committee in terms of a secretariat (responsible for organizing meetings,setting agendas, etc.) and chairperson, composition, frequency of meetings, etc. In eightcountries, respondents indicated that the ministry responsible for agriculture served as thesecretariat of the SPS committee. In three cases, this function was performed by governmentagencies responsible for trade and in two cases by the Bureau of Standards. In most countries,the secretariat function coincided with the function of National Notification Authority (NNA)under the WTO SPS Agreement. This may be appropriate for a number of reasons, inter alia:• The NNA has a broad overview of SPS issues at the country level;• The NNA has an existing mandate to provide a repository of SPS-related information anda dissemination function;• The NNA may be seen as "neutral" if there are contentious issues to be addressed,notably in countries where SPS-related responsibilities are shared across several differentgovernment institutions.10This figure may have changed since 2010, notably due to activities under the PAN-SPSOproject.7