Strengthening the Compliance of the OIC Member States
to International Standards
7
1 INTRODUCTION AND PROJECT OVERVIEW
Product standards are an important source of trade costs for many countries, particularly developing
and least-developed countries, including OIC member states. On the one hand, countries with weak
standards infrastructure lack the support services necessary to promote competitive, high value added
industries in the export sector. In addition, differences in standards design and enforcement between
countries can add to trade costs, and effectively keep some developing country producers out of
important international markets. Product standards therefore pose two crucial issues for OIC member
states: market access, and export competitiveness. This project examines product standards and
international harmonization from those twin dimensions.
The value added of this project is that provides a basis in information and policy analysis upon which
OIC countries can move forward through COMCEC on international standards, with the aim of reducing
trade costs and boosting trade performance. Of particular importance on a policy level is the role of
international standards in mediating relationships in Regional and Global Value Chains (GVCs). Greater
reliance on international standards in GVC-intensive sectors can be expected to assist firms in joining
value chains, and moving up into higher value added activities that have important spillover effects for
the economy at large. The project’s substantive potential is set out in graphical form in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Project motivation—from diagnosis to improvement of outcomes
Source: Author
International
Standards
Diagnostic
Exercise
• Identification of
barriers and
deficiencies.
• Institutional
diagnostics.
Identification
of Best
Practice
• Case studies of
selected OIC
member states.
• Case studies of
selected non-
OIC member
states.
Policy Basis
for Reducing
Trade Costs
and Boosting
Trade
Performance