Sanitary measures imposed on Egypt have negative impact on export: ERF

A working paper published by the Economic Research Forum (ERF) in June stated that sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures (SPS) imposed on Egyptian exports have a negative impact on the probability of exporting new products to new destinations.

Despite the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) efforts to reduce trade-weighted average tariff, non-tariff measures (NTMs) have constantly increased thus raising new challenges for the international trade policy.

NTMs are all policy interventions, other than tariffs, that affect trade in goods and services. These interventions include import quotas, export restraints, government procurement, technical barriers to trade (TBT), sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures (SPS), rules of origin, domestic content requirements, etc.

NTMs add on average an additional 87% on the restrictiveness imposed by tariffs. They are more problematic than tariff barriers because NTMs are concentrated in a smaller number of sectors and in those sectors they are much more restrictive.

Both importing and exporting countries apply these measures, which imply various challenges and additional costs for exporters in developing countries.