GOVERNMENTS AGREE ON A LEGAL
FRAMEWORK FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF GLOBAL
AUTOMOTIVE TECHNICAL REGULATIONS
3 July 1998
After three years of intensive negotiations, representatives
of thirty countries including the United States of America and
Japan as well as the European Union concluded at Geneva, during
the one-hundred-and-fifteenth session of the Working Party on the
Construction of Vehicles (WP.29) of the United Nations Economic
Commission for Europe (UN/ECE), an international Agreement for
the development of global technical regulations for motor
vehicles.
The new Agreement, which will be developed in parallel with
the existing 1958 Agreement, was opened for signature on 25 June
1998 and signed that very day by Ambassador George E. Moose,
Permanent Representative of the United States of America to
the Office of the United Nations and other international
organizations at Geneva, on behalf of his Government.
After its entry into force, which will happen once a number of
countries will have ratified the Agreement, Contracting Parties
to the Agreement will be able to propose rules and regulations
ensuring high levels of safety, environmental protection, energy
efficiency and anti-theft performance to be listed in a
Compendium of Candidate Global Technical Regulations. A given
regulation would be placed in such a Compendium if supported by
at least one third of the Contracting Parties to the Agreement,
including either the European Community, Japan or the United
States of America, provided that they are Contracting Parties to
the Agreement. A given candidate technical regulation will
actually become a global technical regulation by a consensus vote
of the Contracting Parties to the Agreement and listed in a
Global Registry.
The objective of the Agreement is therefore to establish
global technical regulations through harmonization of existing
regulations. Once a regulation is established as global,
Contracting Parties to the Agreement, who voted in its favour are
obligated to adopt it in its own legislation.
The Working Party WP.29 is a United Nations body working under
the auspices of the Economic Commission for Europe's Inland
Transport Committee since 1953. WP.29 is internationally
recognized by Governments and industry as the appropriate forum
for the international regulatory harmonization in the automotive
sector. The new global Agreement is considered a major step in
this direction. Such global harmonization is expected to lead to
the construction of vehicles which ensure high levels of safety
and environmental protection, and which will be manufactured
possibly at lower cost.
The text of the Agreement (ECE/TRANS/132 and Corr.1) is
available on Internet at the following address: http://www.unece.org/trans/main/welcwp29.htm
(click on "WP.29-Working Party and Meetings of
Experts", then on "WP.29*Main Working Party on the
Construction of Vehicles" and go to "Global
Agreement").
For further information please contact:
Mr. J. Capel Ferrer, Director, Transport Division,
or
Mr. J. Jerie, Secretary to WP.29
United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UN/ECE)
Palais des Nations
CH - 1211 GENEVA 10, Switzerland
Phone: (+41 22) 917 24 01
Fax: (+41 22) 917 00 39
E-mail: [email protected] or [email protected]