At present, the implementation of the NTMs is an important and necessary task for Lao PDR after it became a member of the WTO. This workshop provided a brief summary on the actual implementation of NTMs data collection, which started since October 2013. Up to now, there are a lot of achievements, especially the collection of NTMs which related to import and export as well as creating a new catalogue for NTMs in the Lao Trade Portal or Lao PDR Trade Portal (www.laotradeportal.com) and the classification of NTMs based on the UNCTAD classification system. Besides the achievements, there are still some weak points, such as the coordination among the related focal points and the core team still gets delay and sometimes the actual implementations still not comply with the existing regulations.

In addition, the workshop also discussed and learned methods on analyzing NTMs, which includes the cooperation from related sectors or government agencies to look at the reasons and necessary of applying such NTMs. It is clear that the next step of the project is to analyze the effects of the NTMs to the economy, particularly on the import and export. Conduct the assessment to see the benefits and the cost of NTMs while applying a particular NTM.

The workshop was going in energetic atmosphere. Participants showed their interest on the content of the meeting by adding comments and asking questions in detail on various areas of the NTMs field. In addition, most of the related sectors agreed to post their regulations on the Lao Trade Portal website.

At the end, the workshop agreed to hold one by one meetings between the core team at the Department of Import and Export and the focal points to analyze the NTMs which are related to import and export. Core team should continue to ask for representatives from those sectors that have not assigned their staff to be the focal points in order to move on to draft the ministerial decree officially. All the focal points should coordinate closely with the core team and take their time to join workshops of the NRS in order to make sure that everyone is on the same page. NRS will get ready to print the guideline book of the UNCTAD for dissemination. 

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