seventh Appraisal of the Trade Policy Review Mechanism

Report on the second DEDICATED SESSION ON it issues and the
QUESTION-AND-ANSWER process of 19 June 2023

Chairperson: H.E. Mr Saqer Abdullah ALMOQBEL (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia)

1.       The second dedicated session on "IT issues and the question-and-answer process" (so-called "Basket 1") was held on 19 June 2023. The meeting was chaired by Ambassador H.E. Mr Saqer ALMOQBEL (Kingdom of Saudi Arabia).

2.       The Chair indicated that to facilitate discussions, issues 3, 4, and 7 of the Revised Informal Chair Note had been merged into a single issue, "Q&A process". To aid the discussion, the Secretariat displayed on a screen the Chair's suggested changes to the original conclusions, which included a new conclusion with text that referred to some Members' proposals to reduce the number of questions.

3.       With respect to the IT system, one Member commented that the existing IT platform has many more useful functions than Members may think. Various Members made suggestions for improved/new functions that the IT system should incorporate. These include (a) the ability to see questions in real time; (b) the ability to see answers in real time; (c) the ability to support another Member's question; (d) the possibility to cross-reference replies in a user‑friendly way; (e) the inclusion of a hard deadline for uploading questions; (f) the inclusion of a standard template for each question received by the Member under review; (g) the ability to group questions and answers by topic; (h) the ability of the system to address formatting issues; (i) the possibility to filter questions; and (j) that the system should be as user-friendly as the TFA website.

4.       With respect to the issue of seeing questions in real time, one Member pointed out that there is nothing preventing such a feature from being operationalized. Some Members asked how the IT system could alleviate the burden created by the high number of questions received by some Members. The Chair indicated that suggestions for functionality improvements and the system's utility in reducing the burden on the Member under review could be included in the descriptive part of the Chair Note.

5.       There was a discussion on the issue of moving towards a uniform use of the IT system, with proposals on how to achieve and/or incentivize this. The Chair noted that making the IT system mandatory at this time was not possible. Several Members stressed that moving towards the uniform use of the online system should be the objective. Some Members recommended to phase in the adoption of the IT system, with a transitional period involving the IT and the email options running in tandem until Members are comfortable. It was noted that confidence would need to be built and this would necessitate extensive trials, training, and demonstrations to allow Members to become acquainted with the system and for bugs to be identified and fixed. One Member suggested that if all Members use the IT platform, developing countries should receive technical training well in advance of their review. One Member observed that the use of the IT system could have benefits beyond reducing the burden on the Member under review, not least enabling easier public access to the information generated in the review process.

6.       Members discussed the Chair's proposed conclusion to suggest to Members an indicative cap of 75 questions per Member in each review. One Member noted that despite calls in previous appraisals to exercise restraint regarding the number of questions asked, the number of questions received by some Members had continued to increase, making it necessary to further define what "restraint" means. Some Members presented data on what would have been the outcome of the indicative cap for their own TPRs had it been adopted and encouraged other Members to do the same. It was noted that the indicative cap would only refer to advance questions and not follow‑up questions and that, if a Member supported another Member's question, that would not count towards the cap.

7.       One Member noted that while there is agreement that questions need to be rationalized, the starting point could be to see if technology options have the effect of reducing the number of questions organically, before having a cap. One Member suggested that Members should be reminded each time a TPRB meeting is convened of the need to exercise restraint on the number of questions asked. Another Member said there is a need to improve the quality of the questions asked. One Member observed that the number of questions in a TPR is influenced by the number of policy changes during the review period, so the number of questions will vary per Member.

8.       Other issues raised by Members during the meeting included (a) a proposal, as a complement to the indicative cap, to have an interactive question‑and‑answer session under the Chatham House Rule on the Review's second meeting, focusing on areas that generate the most questions; (b) the issue of the adequacy of timelines in the TPR process (particularly with respect to the timelines faced by Members to consider the report and to prepare and answer written questions; and (c) the advantages of moving to a single, uniform timeline.

9.       The Chair closed the meeting by indicating that the next session on "IT issues and the question-and-answer process" would take place on Friday, 7 July at 3 p.m. in room D. He noted that the descriptive part of the report will be introduced to Members before the third session of this first basket of issues. The Chair's proposed conclusions resulting from this second dedicated session are attached.