TPP Regulatory
Coherence
Auckland, New Zealand
December 8, 2010
Sean Heather
Executive Director
Global Regulatory Cooperation Project
U.S. Chamber of Commerce
sheather@uschamber.com
GOAL:
To ensure that TPP member countries
maintain transparent, effective, enforceable
and mutually coherent regulatory systems
which are both risk and science based, adhere
to international best practices, and assure
high levels of collaboration among TPP
governments and their stakeholders.
Result:
Effective regulation, facilitating trade of goods
and services, competitive economies, &
economic growth.
How do we get there?
How do we get there?
PARADIGM SHIFT
How do we get there?
TRUST
How do we get there?
Horizontal & Vertical Approach
How do we get there?
Horizontal Chapter
• Preamble – Paradigm Shift
• Identification of Best Practices
Make APEC-OECD Checklist Operational
Effectively Begin to Address Internal and External Coherence
• Mechanism for Dialogue – Building Trust
Preamble
CONCERNS
•
Despite the highly integrated nature of the global economy, regulatory
frameworks continue to be largely developed in isolation, country by country.
•
The growth of disparate regulatory regimes creates uncertainty, high costs and
inefficiencies, and enforcement challenges for individual countries, their
consumers, their industries and their workers.
•
Consumers lose confidence in their own regulator’s ability to act effectively in a
global economy and lose confidence in products and services.
Preamble
CONCERNS
•
The risk of consumer harm increases when regulators fail to comprehend the
international implications of their regulatory action or inaction and therefore fail
to adequately capture risks as a result of regulatory divergence.
•
Regulators often do not have the capacity or capability to develop, implement and
enforce regulations that they’ve established to compete with similar regulations in
other countries.
•
Regulatory coherence doesn’t require loss of regulatory power or sovereignty.
•
Regulations that is not pro-competitive, is not risk and science based will harm the
competitiveness of the economy.
•
Products and services that cross borders face a growing array of regulations in
multiple countries that can range from being opaque to duplicative to conflicting.
Preamble
CONCERNS
•
Poorly crafted regulations create unnecessary trade and investment barriers,
increase costs and lower consumer benefits when regulators act in isolation, failing
thereby to promulgate regulations that are consistent with and support the
development of open and competitive markets.
•
Manufacturers, service providers, retailers, SMEs, and farmers face arbitrary,
duplicative and oftentimes opaque regulatory processes that fail to take into
account their views and experiences.
•
The more barriers to trade that are created, the more citizens of our countries are
deprived of new technology and new opportunities to have available products,
raw materials, machinery, and services that allow for real economic growth within
our economies.
Preamble
BENEFITS
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
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The citizens of TPP countries would have a higher degree of confidence that
regulations are providing the appropriate safeguards which are properly enforced,
including enhanced confidence in traded products and services.
Regulators would be better able to fulfill their enforcement mandate, with a riskbased focus to ensure optimal allocation of resources.
Improved transparency in regulation and enforcement.
Reigning in of unintended consequences of regulation would increase consumer
access to a wide choice of goods and services at better prices.
Boost the competitiveness of our economy.
Regulation would be developed with sensitivities to the global market and with
regard to limiting the adverse impact to trade and investment.
Businesses would have better predictability with regard to regulatory frameworks
and their enforcement.
SMEs’ entry into foreign markets would be better facilitated.
How do we get there?
Horizontal Chapter
• Preamble – Paradigm Shift
• Identification of Best Practices
Make APEC-OECD Checklist Operational
Effectively Begin to Address Internal and External Coherence
• Mechanism for Dialogue – Building Trust
How do we get there?
Identification of Best Practices
Make APEC-OECD Checklist Operational
Effectively Begin to Address Internal and External Coherence
KEY -Professionalize & Depoliticize
How do we get there?
Horizontal Chapter
• Preamble – Paradigm Shift
• Identification of Best Practices
Make APEC-OECD Checklist Operational
Effectively Begin to Address Internal and External Coherence
• Mechanism for Dialogue – Building Trust
How do we get there?
Mechanism for Dialogue – Building Trust
1) Trust Between Regulators
2) Trust Between Business & Regulators
Trust Between Regulators & Consumers
3)Trust Between Business & Consumers
Example: U.S. – EU HLRCF
Vertical Approach
• Chapter-by-chapter basis a list of regulatory coherence deliverables
should be generated.
– Ex. MOUs, MRAs, Essential Equivalence Arrangements.
• Where feasible, and on a sector-specific basis, best regulatory
practices could be highlighted for the regulated industry, including
particular approaches to addressing common trade-related issues
that reflect past relevant regulatory experiences.