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Closing the divide between Europe and America

25/02/2013

For the first time in the nursery industry’s history, the divide between Europe and America’s regulations looks set to narrow potentially opening doors to easier trading across the continents.

In February, Robert Anslow, managing director of the Baby Products Association (BPA) and an active member of the European Nursery Products Confederation (ENPC) attended meetings in Washington with the Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association (JPMA) to look at working closely together on global standardisation, regulations and particularly recall procedures.

Robert comments: “For many years different standards and procedures across the continents have caused restrictions and knock on effects for companies in the nursery industry. The anomalies in standards and regulations mean that adaptions have to be made to products prior to trading intercontinentally and more seriously; product recalls made in one country may not apply to others but still have serious consequences for brand reputation.”

This is an exciting development for all companies in the nursery sector worldwide as an ‘umbrella’ approach to Standards will not only simplify international trading but will set a united precedence to the rest of the world. Representatives from ENPC and JPMA will meet at Harrogate Nursery Fair in March to take initial discussions further.

At a higher level, the European Standards Organisations (CEN, CENELEC and ETSI) and the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) met in February and agreed that they will maintain and intensify their collaboration with a view to aligning standards, which is necessary in order to facilitate trade in both goods and services between Europe and the USA. This collaboration is set to become increasingly important as the European Union and United States are about to begin negotiations on a Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership.

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