ARISE+ Indonesia supported the National Standardization Agency (BSN) to enhance the TBT (Technical Barriers to Trade) website: https://tbt.bsn.go.id/home. The upgraded website was lunched in a hybrid event in December 2022 and is expected to facilitate the role of BSN as the Notification Body and Inquiry Point for the WTO TBT Agreement in Indonesia.
The TBT website was initially developed in 2013 by BSN as Indonesia's National Notification Body and Enquiry Point for the WTO-TBT Agreement to publish notifications from the WTO Members and to provide transparency. Notifying technical regulations, standards, and conformity assessment procedures is vital to prevent unnecessary barriers to international trade and concerns from WTO member countries. The improved website increases the participation of relevant ministries and institutions in the discussion of notifications and facilitates internal coordination to prevent technical barriers to trade with partner countries.
Some of the features that are the result of the enhanced WTO Indonesia TBT Website include information on analysis of notifications on draft technical regulations of WTO Members that have been submitted by the secretariat of the WTO TBT Committee. This analysis is carried out on draft technical regulations that may cause trade barriers to Indonesian businesses. Through this feature, it is expected that businesses can conduct a review of regulations from WTO Members and respond to notifications.
An additional feature is a “Forum”. This feature facilitates discussions related to trade barriers for businesses to partner countries, in the form of cross-sector discussions of notifications or by providing data needed in negotiations at the WTO TBT Committee forum.
Furthermore, the TBT WTO Indonesia website provides information regarding draft technical regulations for WTO Members through the “Notification” feature which displays the comment period, making it easier for users to submit inputs and respond to notifications. Additionally, the “Event” feature contains information related to activities, thematic sessions that took place during the WTO TBT Committee Session, etc.
The WTO Indonesia TBT Website will facilitate businesses in obtaining information regarding draft technical regulations, standards and conformity assessment procedures that will be enforced by WTO Members, as well as in resolving technical trade barriers disputes.
"We thank EU-funded ARISE+ Indonesia for developing the BSN-TBT Website and hope that the cooperation between BSN and ARISE+ Indonesia will grow stronger to improve Indonesia's Good Regulatory Practice (GRP)," Dr Zakiyah said.