Standards as Enablers of Trade and Innovation: Balancing Harmonisation, Competitiveness, and Openness
Few issues provoke as spirited a debate in trade and economic development circles as the role of standards. Do they act as lubricants to make trade frictionless, or are they hidden roadblocks that slow it down? This question is far from academic. It has real consequences for businesses, governments, and consumers, particularly in regions like the East African Community (EAC), where efforts at integration and harmonisation are accelerating.
Having served on a standards development committee myself, I often find that conversations around standards reveal their duality. They can either facilitate cooperation, efficiency, and safety, or become cumbersome instruments of protectionism and rigidity.
A proper understanding of this dualism can enable us to position standards as critical and strategic tools for trade promotion rather than barriers.
Why Standards Matter
At the most fundamental level, standards reduce transaction costs. When two parties trade across borders, they need a common language, not only in words, but also in technical expectations. Standards provide this language. They define what constitutes safe voltage in an electrical plug, how food safety should be measured, or how digital communication protocols should be coded.
Without standards, trade would resemble the construction of the Tower of Babel. Business transactions could be affected by costly testing, lengthy negotiations, and mistrust. These often have detrimental effects on supply chains and thus affect regional and global trade.
The WTO’s (World Trade Organisation) Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) explicitly recognises this. It does not outlaw standards; conversely, it encourages them, but insists they should not be used as disguised trade restrictions. Instead, they should be grounded in transparency, necessity, and international reference points.
In practice, when technical standards align with global norms, exporters find entry into foreign markets far smoother. When they diverge, whether due to protectionist intent or simple historical issues, they increase compliance costs, erode competitiveness, and in some cases deter trade altogether.
Standards as Regional Connectors
In the EAC context, the conversation on harmonisation has been ongoing for years. The different national bureaus of standards, each with its legacy, are now tasked with bringing their requirements into alignment.
The rationale is straightforward: if standards differ among EAC countries, a Ugandan firm might find exporting to Tanzania as complex as exporting to Europe. Harmonisation reduces those internal frictions, making the region more attractive to both local entrepreneurs and foreign investors.
One success story lies in agricultural trade. For example, the EAC has worked on harmonising standards for staple foods like maize and beans. This reduces disputes over aflatoxin levels or packaging requirements at border points. More needs to be worked on across other sectors to make cross-border trade as seamless as possible.
In pharmaceuticals, alignment on Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) guidelines helps create a regional ecosystem where medicines can move more freely and consumers have greater confidence in their safety.
That said, harmonisation is not always straightforward, as the rationale behind it. Each country has domestic industries to protect, local lobbying pressures, and capacity constraints in laboratories and certification bodies. Progress is often uneven. Still, without such regional initiatives, intra-African trade risks being strangled by fragmentation.
So, the harmonisation must be undertaken. Any country with capacity constraints gets challenged to upgrade and catch up with the rest, which promotes growth. This requires goodwill and a willingness to invest, sometimes heavily, to be at the same level as others, and this need not be overemphasised.
Are Standards Region-Specific?
A common critique, which was raised in a discussion I participated in a while back, was that standards tend to be region-specific and therefore lack interoperability. To some extent, this is true. Standards are often born of local realities and requirements.
For instance, climatic conditions, cultural practices, or existing industrial capacities differ. Consider a building code in Japan, which might account for earthquakes in a way that an EAC country has little reason to prioritise.
Yet the value of standards increases with their interoperability. This is why the principle of “adopt international where possible, adapt where necessary” is so important. If regional standards stray too far from international benchmarks, local producers risk becoming locked into a limited regional market and unable to scale globally.
Additionally, standards that are blindly copied from international norms without consideration of local realities may impose costs that outstrip their benefits. This may impede local startups or stumble existing industries.
The challenge, then, is to balance global alignment with regional adaptation. The EAC, for instance, continues to align with international standards bodies like ISO and Codex Alimentarius to tailor their requirements to local conditions. This ensures its firms are not left isolated but also not overburdened.
Standards as Strategic Trade Policy Tools
Beyond harmonisation, standards can be positioned strategically to promote trade. A few pathways stand out in the immediate:
- Market Access and Trust
High-quality standards, especially in sensitive sectors like food safety and medical devices, build consumer trust. For EAC exporters, demonstrating compliance with credible standards can open doors to new and bigger markets in Europe, North America, and Asia. In this sense, standards act as a passport for goods. - Industrial Upgrading
Standards can also raise the bar for domestic firms and challenge them to invest in better processes and technologies. When industries align with international standards, they not only expand their export potential but also upgrade their competitiveness. - Soft Power and Influence
Participation in global standard-setting bodies allows regions like the EAC to contribute to the rules of the game rather than passively accept them. This is an often-overlooked dimension of standards. They are not neutral. They embody choices about technology, safety, and economic interests. Strategically, having a seat at the table matters a great deal.
Guarding Against Standards as Barriers
Yet, we cannot ignore the darker side. Standards sometimes morph into non-tariff barriers, particularly when weaponised for protectionism. Stringent requirements, sudden changes, or opaque certification processes can shut out smaller exporters. Even within the regional blocks, firms often complain of “standards-on-paper” not being implemented uniformly at border points, leading to delays and extra costs.
There is also the danger of standards stifling innovation. If rules are too rigid, they may lock firms into outdated technologies or discourage experimentation. For instance, digital standards developed without consideration of emerging technologies like blockchain or AI may quickly become obsolete and hold back innovation.
The solution then is to design standards that are performance-based rather than overly prescriptive. Instead of dictating exactly how a product must be made, they should specify the outcomes it must achieve. That is, in terms of safety, energy efficiency, or environmental impact. This leaves room for innovators to devise new ways of meeting those outcomes.
Personal Reflections
In committee rooms, I have often seen the tension between the technocrats who want rigorous detail, the industry representatives who want flexibility, and the policymakers who want quick wins. The negotiation is not always smooth. Yet, it is precisely in these discussions that the dual role of standards becomes visible.
I am convinced that standards, if approached strategically, are more of a bridge than a barrier. They are not merely technical documents gathering dust on shelves. They are instruments of trust, competitiveness, and integration. The key lies in ensuring they are transparent, inclusive, and future-oriented.
Perhaps the biggest lesson is that standards are not static. For a fact. They must evolve alongside technology and markets. This requires strong regional institutions, sustained stakeholder engagement, and deliberate investment in capacity-building.
Investing in state-of-the-art testing laboratories, robust and agile certification agencies, and creating awareness among the key stakeholders, especially SMEs, is a must.
Tossing the Coin
Do standards promote or hinder trade? The honest answer is: they can do both. Left unchecked, they risk becoming narrow-minded, protectionist, and innovation-stifling. But when harmonised thoughtfully, linked to international benchmarks, and designed with flexibility, they become powerful enablers of regional cooperation and global competitiveness.
For the EAC, the path forward is clear. Harmonisation must continue, but always with an eye to interoperability with global systems. Standards must be positioned not as bureaucratic hurdles but as strategic tools of trade policy and industrial upgrading. And most importantly, they must be crafted in ways that welcome innovation rather than suppress it.
As I often remind myself, every standard adopted is not just a technical specification. It is a choice about the kind of regional and global economy/cooperation we want to build. If we get that choice right, standards will not just regulate trade, they will promote, empower, and sustain it.
