Sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures refer to any of the laws, rules, standards, and

procedures that governments employ to protect humans, other animals, and plants from
diseases, pests, toxins, and other contaminants. Examples of SPS measures include meat
and poultry processing standards to reduce pathogens, residue limits for pesticides in
foods, and regulation of agricultural biotechnology

INDIA is losing out on export opportunities as domestic producers are unable to meet the
requirements of the SPS (sanitary and phytosanitary) agreement signed during the
Uruguay round of WTO negotiations to safeguard the health of plant, animal and human
life in any country.

It is being pointed out that India was passively adopting CA (Codex Alimentarius), a
collection of international food standards for all principle food products, but did not have
any process for developing international standards. "Though a national Codex committee
and a Central Committee for Food Standards exist," he said.

The country must immediately identify commodities that are of special interest to each
state and undertake commodity specific study for SPS. The study must also cover the
international market, its size, spread, the number of players, their strengths and
weaknesses, as also find the corresponding domestic support, export subsidies, and
import tariffs, he said.

Commodity specific national-level groups should be formed, he said.

The strategies for SPS management would include appropriate legislation and standards,
as also basic research, diagnosis and analysis. He also stressed the need for quarantine
procedures, including emergency measures, to sustain pest or disease-free areas.

According to the India Development Foundation (IDF), a private non-profit research

foundation, the country must clear several bottlenecks if it hoped to gain from SPS
standards. Foremost among these was the need for modern technology both in production
and processing, to increase productivity.

To help industries adopt modern technology, adequate information and credit facilities
must be made available, IDF said.

Enhanced transport facilities must be developed to ensure timely and safe movement of
the perishable products, it added.

Sanitary and phytosanitary measures, by their very nature, may result in restrictions on
trade. All governments accept the fact that some trade restrictions may be necessary to
ensure food safety and animal and plant health protection. However, governments are
sometimes pressured to go beyond what is needed for health protection and to use
sanitary and phytosanitary restrictions to shield domestic producers from
economic competition. Such pressure is likely to increase as other trade barriers are
reduced as a result of the Uruguay Round agreements. A sanitary or phytosanitary
restriction which is not actually required for health reasons can be a very effective
protectionist device, and because of its technical complexity, a particularly deceptive and
difficult barrier to challenge.
Food systems are in a process of profound changes on a global scale. Multinational
food processing and retailing companies spread globally. This trend is driven by
changing consumer demand for food with new safety and quality attributes and by
liberalized trade and investment policies. While the influence of the public sector has
gradually diminished, private companies bring about new approaches in supply chain
governance including private food safety and quality standards. Closely interlinked with
these trends, agriculture and food trade patterns are changing internationally . These
developments have important implications for all stakeholders involved in food supply
chains, including small-scale farmers in poor countries

Increased demand for high-value agricultural products is fueling competition in the

global food system . As a consequence, global food trade has gained a
much more prominent role during the last decades. are often less integrated and the
regulatory framework is less robust.
Increased international food trade has led to the introduction of more stringent food
quality and food safety regulations in developed countries to regulate the emerging
more complex food markets. The agreement on sanitary and phytosanitary measures
(SPS) and the accompanying agreement World Trade Organization (WTO) are an indicator
of these developments at the international level.

Food scares have induced renewed efforts in the public sector to improve the quality
and safety of food supply Within the supply chains, private
actors drive the increasing number of regulations by introducing their own or
industry-wide private standards .This strategy is pursued to differentiate products from those
of competitors.

Furthermore, by pre-emptive standard setting before public institutions do so, firms

can choose a strategy to minimize their costs.

It is argued however that private standards are mainly introduced as a response to

consumers’ food safety concerns and in order to meet changing consumer preferences
. However, at the international level private sector regulations do not fall under the
jurisdiction of the WTO and therefore
pose a new challenge to the international trade policy debate
Also within countries it is not always clear for the public sector, how to deal with
regulations emanating from the private sector. With the introduction of private standards, the
food safety transformation has gained an unprecedented impetus

In a globalizing world changing food systems can be seen on a continuum of increasing

commercialization of the agricultural sector, also in developing countries. Traditionally the
public sector had major influence on agricultural commercialization and changes in the food
system through the provision of macroeconomic stability, infrastructure development and
good governance
Besides the well-known determinants of trade in general and food in particular , showed that
consumers influence agricultural and food trade patterns through their higher valuation of
food quality and food safety attributes. Consumers with changing preferences force retailers,
processors and other upstream supply chain actors to adapt their strategies to meet new
demand patterns. In this way, changing consumer preferences are at the heart of the food
system transformation .

Retailers have found food markets in developing countries increasingly saturated,

they have shifted their focus to emerging and developing country economies. In
anticipation of these developments, retailers in national markets forestall required
changes to be competitive once foreign direct investment enters a country. These
developments induce growing competition in domestic food markets not only on price
but increasingly on food quality and food safety. Competition at the retail level

impacts on traditional supply chains throughout all stages. Adaptive measures like
new governance structures including new food quality and food safety regulations are
enforced. By setting private standards, supermarkets create their own, dedicated
supplier base. In this way they have positioned themselves to be highly competitive in
food markets that have been traditionally not well integrated.
Fruit and vegetables fit into the group of food items that are also most often affected
by SPS measures.
They are perishable and susceptible to be contaminated with microbiological agents or
pesticide residues. At the cultivation, post-harvest, and processing level, fruits and vegetables
are characterized by limited economies of scale. Hence, they have the potential to play an
important role as employment generator in rural development and poverty reduction
strategies