Study of the consequences of the application of sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures on ACP countries

This study examines the European Union’s Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) legislation in order to identify what measures related to consumer health and safety in the area of foodstuffs act as barriers to imports from ACP countries. The paper also attempts to identify the channels through which these effects are transmitted, and assesses the impact on ACP country exports and infrastructure and on individual exporters/growers/processors.

Findings include:

• there are 24 Regulations and Directives that represent the principal source of SPS-related impact on ACP countries. The most prominent are:
  • the General Principles and Requirements of Food Law EC R178/02
  • the Pesticide Regulation on MRLs EC Directive 91/414
  • New Hygiene Regulations replacing EC/93/43
• the impact on products is fairly consistent with all fruit and vegetable exports being affected to a noticeable extent
• this impact relates mainly to additional costs for some exporters, but for other smaller producers it means that they are deterred from any exporting to the EU
• the high costs of making initial compliance is also an obstacle to firms currently supplying exporters to move into the higher added-value sector of food processing for export
• of all sectors, fish is likely to be impacted the most in the near future because of the harmonisation in EU authorisation procedures
• the overall cost to ACP countries of SPS measures are estimated to be between €140m and €700m per year

The study concludes that there is a need to focus more assistance at the sub-sector level, particularly to small firms who are often overlooked by the large technical assistance schemes of many aid agencies. Specific recommendations include:

• large EU supermarket chains should spread the cost of wider sector SPS compliance throughout the food chain via Public Private Partnerships with national governments
• local inspection sites should be established and manned by inspectors from a number of states to reduce the harmful effects of EU import bans
• implementation of EU conformity assessment procedures in fish imports should be delayed
• micro credit schemes should be set to assist the very small business to acquire basic SPS equipment

[adapted from author]