Orgalime comments on the Commission’s proposal for Regulatory Cooperation in the framework of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)
Orgalime welcomes the European Commission’s textual proposal on Regulatory Cooperation that was tabled during the 8th round of negotiations and made publicly available shortly after. We consider that this draft proposal sets ambitious yet pragmatic targets. The negotiations on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) should not be expected to instantly establish a “transatlantic internal market”. While the free circulation of goods among the two trade partners can be beneficial under the necessary conditions, it can prove detrimental if established without prudent assessment and longstanding cooperation.
In this framework, we express hereof some suggestions on improving the Commission’s textual proposal on Regulatory Cooperation in a way that would facilitate reducing non-tariff barriers – such as differences in technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment procedures. These are often costly and time consuming for companies who want to sell their products on both markets.
We would like to reiterate our overall vision and position that any regulatory cooperation in TTIP should be accompanied by efforts to achieve the goal of “one standard, one test accepted everywhere”, including cooperation in the framework of ISO and IEC in order to achieve the harmonisation of standards both at transatlantic level and globally. In this context, Orgalime also urges government representatives of the EU, U.S. and the European Free Trade Agreement (EFTA) member countries to stay in close contact during the negotiations. The EU, the U.S. and
EFTA have close economic relations and are economically interlinked through industrial supply chains.