RULES OF ORIGIN

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Rules of origin are the criteria used to determine where a product is made. Determining rules of origin is central in implementing trade preferences because they set out the conditions with which a product must comply in order to benefit from this preferential treatment. Non-preferential rules of origin are also important for implementing other trade policy measures, including country-of-origin labels, quotas, anti-dumping measures and countervailing duties.

With the multiplication of regional trade agreements, an increasing number of countries apply a variety of different sets of preferential rules of origin. In addition, a growing number of WTO members have also introduced non-preferential origin requirements. As a result, there is growing demand for transparency and a better understanding of these requirements.

To simplify and centralise access to such requirements, notifications received by the WTO Secretariat regarding members' preferential and non-preferential rules of origin are now directly accessible via the revised webpage. For non-preferential rules of origin, a scroll-down menu allows users to quickly check which WTO members apply or do not apply non-preferential rules of origin and, in the case of the former, to access details on their relevant rules.

For preferential rules of origin, details can be retrieved through the WTO Preferential Trade Agreements database and the WTO's Regional Trade Agreements Information System.

The revised webpage on rules of origin also contains new features, such as streamlined menus and centralized information, documents for meetings, links to relevant disputes, and information on technical assistance. In addition, the content has been updated to reflect the current work of the WTO's Committee on Rules of Origin.

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