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Symposium on the 20th Anniversary of the Information Technology Agreement

Day 2 | Wednesday, 28 June 2017 Morning session

Existing challenges and opportunities

Area of focus:

Energy efficiency policies and programs that create non-tariff

barriers to trade

Three ideas

• Partnership and collaboration between industry and government

• Alignment of regulatory and non-regulatory policies

• Policies that support innovation

Partnership and collaboration

• Dialogue and collaboration with the consumer tech industry can save time and public resources, help technical understanding, identify best practices, and avoid problem approaches

Energy efficiency and savings achievements

Overall, more devices…

…but less total energy

Best practices

• Policy: Voluntary, market-oriented approaches save energy, support innovation and benefit trade

• Technology: Home automation, IoT could cut energy consumption 10%*

* The Energy Savings Potential of Home Automation Technology

Alignment of policies and programs

• Bilateral and multilateral efforts are useful

• Local non-harmonized regulatory actions can undermine national and regional alignment efforts

• Test standards are fundamental

Innovation-friendly policies

• Growing importance of voluntary agreements and initiatives – Key characteristics – Global growth – Recent expansion

Characteristics of voluntary agreements

• Broad coverage • Significant commitment • Ability to reach installed base and new stock • Built-in accountability and transparency • Ability to adapt quickly and flexibly • Supports innovation and competition • Savings achieved faster than regulation

Global growth of voluntary agreements

• Australia (set-top boxes) • European Union (broadband equipment, imaging

equipment, set-top boxes, game consoles) • United States (set-top boxes, small network

equipment) • Most recent: Canada (set-top boxes)

– announced January 2017, energyefficiency-va.ca

Connected Devices Alliance • Launched in 2015, governments and industry • Globally coordinated actions related to savings

from networks and networked devices • Established “Voluntary Principles for Energy

Efficient Connected Devices” • CTA is a supporting organization • cda.iea-4e.org

Benefits to governments and local economies

• Save energy, save time/resources, facilitate economic growth, reduce burdens for global market access by SMEs, startups and others

Challenges

• Steady increase in NTBs related to energy efficiency policies

• Insufficient discipline on technical regulations under current agreements

Next steps

• We understand the problem. What about a solution?

Recommended solutions

• Countries must adhere to their TBT Agreement obligations

• Partner with industry to gain technical understanding, and align on best practices

Recommended solutions

• This industry is fast-moving. We need flexible, market-oriented, aligned voluntary approaches that keep pace with the market, benefit consumers and support innovation.

Recommended solutions • Continue to focus on NTBs that inhibit trade in

consumer technology products through regular, periodic discussions at the WTO TBT and ITA Committees.

• Study and catalogue the numerous NTBs that the consumer technology industry faces in order to facilitate consideration of next steps toward resolving these problems.

Douglas JOHNSON djohnson@cta.tech