Country of Origin
In International Trade many rules exist. Next to trade between nations that is regulated through WTO agreements, also a manifold of (Free) Trade Agreements exist. In order to identify if products or services in such agreements are really in scope of such an agreement, Rules need to be defined.
Already in the early days of GATT (General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) it was recognized by signatories that rules are necessary to determine which products are subjected to trade between signatories and which were not.
Basically we can identify two sorts of rules of origin. The general ones in normal trade and preferential rules that are used for preferential treatment, lower to zero tariffs at importation, between countries or group of countries. Does this make life easier? It certainly does, but only in a way that some basic guidelines and principles are used, next to clear defi nitions. However, to check if products in Free Trade Agreements are actually entitled to preferential treatment, every Agreement should be carefully checked. And there are more than 200 of them!
It should not be taken for granted that a certain percentage used in one Agreement is also used in another, even if both are of the same country. The EU is trying to use also as many standards as possible, but it is inevitable to work your way through these rules as well.
This part of the Acqui will guide you through the most important Rules of Origin, looking from various different perspectives and also different organizations that are involved. It should be considered as a basic introduction and not as a comprehensive lecture covering everything, since this is almost impossible. On the other hand it should create suffi cient basic knowledge to understand those various interpretations if, when and where Rules of Origin are used and to be able to identify if particular products or groups of products have special requirements for both non preferential as well as preferential treatment.
That these rules are important, but also controversial in International Trade is simply demonstrated by the 14 years of negotiations needed to harmonize the nonpreferential rules used within WTO. And it is still not completed!