欧美技术性贸易壁垒对珠三角地区玩具业的影响及防范措施.doc

摘 要

随着世界贸易日趋全球化，许多发达国家更多的利用技术性贸易壁垒来控制进口。欧美地区作为珠三角地区玩具业出口的集中市场，其技术性贸易壁垒的影响越来越深远。如何迅速、有效地应对欧美技术性贸易壁垒是当前政府、行业组织和出口企业的首要任务。首先，本文分析了珠三角地区玩具业的现状及存在问题。接着，根据技术性贸易壁垒的两个主要影响因素，本文概括了珠三角地区玩具业受欧美技术性贸易壁垒影响下的四个方面。最后，本文针对欧美技术性贸易壁垒对玩具业的影响所提出了五点防范措施。希望本文对珠三角地区玩具业应对欧美技术性贸易壁垒提供有效建议。
关键词：技术性贸易壁垒；玩具业；影响方面；防范措施

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Table of Contents
Abstract i
摘要 ii
1. Introduction 1
1.1 Background and significance 1
1.2 Research questions and methodologies 1
1.3 Innovation points 1
2. Literature Review 3
2.1 The relevant research abroad 3
2.2 The relevant research in China 3
3. Current Situation on Toy Industry of Pearl River Delta Region 4
3.1 Single production mode 4
3.2 Shortage of independent brand 4
3.3 Over-centralized export market 4
3.4 Lack of standardized supervision 4
4. Impact of TBT from the Occident on Toy Industry 6
4.1 Impact factors 6
4.1.1 Technical regulations 6
4.1.2 Conformity assessment procedures 6
4.2 Impact aspects 7
4.2.1 Export restriction 7
4.2.2 Products recalled in batches 7
4.2.3 Production costs increased 8
4.2.4 Reputation damage 9
5. Countermeasures 10
5.1 Establishing specialized TBT consultative center 10
5.2 Establishing industrial warning mechanism 11
5.3 Establishing quality and safety traceability system 11
5.4 Establishing products detection system 12
5.5 Improving old and introducing new technologies 12
6. Conclusion 13
6.1 Major findings of the current study 13
6.2 Limitations and suggestions for further research 13
Bibliography 14
Acknowledgements 15

1. Introduction
1.1 Background and Significance
Along with the China’s participation in World Trade Organization(WTO) and the globalization of the world economy, the competition of international market becomes more and more intense and complex. Nowadays, the influence of traditional trade barriers, namely tariff barriers, has reduced gradually. Compared with traditional trade barriers, non-tariff barriers(NTBs) have some advantages, such as non-transparency and greater effect(Zhang Sufang, 2003:91). With the features of NTBs, TBT begins to have increasingly tangible and intangible influence on international trade.
At present, TBT has become the largest non-tariff barriers that interferes the toy exports of Pearl River Delta Region. It is too late to take action when we take lessons. Therefore, this requires government, industry organizations and enterprises to work together and try hard to overcome this crisis. In view of the new characteristics of international trade protection and the existing problems of our nation’s toy industry development, this paper starts from analyzing the current situation and existing problems of toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region. After that, it makes an intensive study of the major affected aspects on toy export trade of Pearl River Delta Region from TBT of the Occident through two main factors of TBT. And finally, it puts forward several effective countermeasures to help toy industry to step across TBT. Thus, it has important theoretical and practical significance on the development of toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region. And it is hoped to be helpful for toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region to overcome the difficulties.

1.2 Research Questions and Methodologies
The dissertation is primarily concerned with the following four research questions:
(1)What’s the current situation of toy industry in Pearl River Delta Region?
(2)What are the major factors which impact the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region from TBT?
(3)How have the major factors influenced the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region?
(4)What are the countermeasures to respond to the TBT from the Occident?
The present study, according to the profound analysis of present materials and combined with several practical cases, responds to the above research questions and has a summary of the whole dissertation.

1.3 Innovation Points
From the present literature reviews, it is not hard to see that researches on a specific product or region which has suffered from TBT are seldom, particularly on the toy industry. Most of them give researches on the problems so superficially that they can not provide effective ways to help injured party to solve the problem. Besides, TBT from the Occident has a heavy hit on the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region, which has arisen a series of problems. With the present researches and literatures, it is essential to have a research on this field.
Therefore, the innovation point of this paper is that it concentrates on a specific product in a specific region, and that is the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region. From the economic perspective, this paper aims to research the impact of TBT from the Occident on toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region and propose effective countermeasures to help the export enterprises to overcome the difficulties.

2. Literature Review
2.1 The Relevant Research Abroad
Since the 70s of the 20th century, foreign scholars were initially involved in the research of TBT. Robert E. Baldwin (1970:143) puts forward that technology and management laws and regulations normally associated with health, safety or other important public interests concerned, often become unnecessary barriers to trade between different countries or health goals in a safe form of trade differences unnecessary distortion and should be eliminated. For issues of developing countries to TBT, Sherry Stephenson (1997) gives a more comprehensive representation to the relevant standards in developing countries from the policy and institutional aspect. John S. Wilson (1999) has the analysis of the impact of developing countries from the implementation of the relevant agreements on the WTO and its exports. From the empirical research, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development(OECD) (1999) has a survey to collect large numbers of industrial data to analyze the impact level of TBT on trade costs, and the conclusion is that it accounts for 2% to 10% of the whole production costs if the export products should achieve the different standards and technical regulations required by the members of OECD which have included the cost of testing and certification. Tsunehiro Otsuki (2000) has analyzed the export impact of Africa due to the content standards of aflatoxin improved by the European Union. With the analysis of the data of trade and regulations for 15 European Union countries and 9 African countries from 1989 to 1998, he has given the conclusion that since the European Union has implemented the strict content standards of aflatoxin, the annual exports have decreased 60%.

2.2 The Relevant Research in China
After the 90s of the 20th century, domestic scholars began to focus on the analysis of the Model Code to GATT(General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade) and sources of TBT. From the perspective of standardization, Ye Bolin & Chen Zhitian (1992) have analyzed the problem of TBT, and made a framework analysis of the formation of codes of standards, the concept and basic content of TBT and the technical regulation system of developed countries. For the impact of TBT to China’s export trade, Xia Youfu (1999) has analyzed the impact of China’s export trade from TBT from the industrial aspect and proposed policy recommendations. Since China's accession to WTO, domestic scholars engaged in paying attention to the role of domestic technical trade protection system on how to cope with foreign barriers and proctect domestic market and industrial development. For instance, Sun Jingshui (2005) has pointed out that formulating and implementing standardization strategy are the most urgent and effective way for our nation to establish technical trading protection system and safeguard national interests and step across technical barriers.

3. Current Situation on Toy Industry of Pearl River Delta Region
3.1 Single Production Mode
According to the classification of industrial structure, the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region belongs to labor-intensive industry. It is destined that the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region has single production mode. Compared with the international toy giant, most of the toy industry in Pearl River Delta Region are in small scale and produce with conventional processing equipments. Even 90% of its toy enterprises are known as Original Equipment Manufacturer(OEM). Under OEM, sellers use the brand name or trademark designated by buyers on their manufactured goods(Zhou Ruiqi, Wang Xiaoou & Xu Yuefang, 2010:108). Besides, the majority of the products are the low added value products, such as plastic toys and stuffed toys. Due to this single production mode, the toy industry in this region has difficulties to transform and upgrade to technology-intensive industry or capital-intensive industry.

3.2 Shortage of Independent Brand
As a result of the single production mode, the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region has the shortage of independent brand. In the chain of design, production and sales, the toy industry in this region is only at the end of added value. Compared with the worldwide famous toy brands, such as Denmark’s LEGO, America’s RUSS and DISNEY, Pearl River Delta Region has seldom famous toy brands. Furthermore, the lack of innovation capability makes the toy enterprises still depend on the technology and design provided by the foreign customers. Because of this, the passive management risk undertaked for “design defects” is increasingly apparent.

3.3 Over-centralized Export Market
According to Chinese Customs’ statistics, the Occident is still the main toy export market for Pearl River Delta Region, accounting for 67.1% of total exports. When the toy enterprises receive orders from the overseas customers, they organize production and then sell abroad. Even though the centralized export market can guarantee the market saleroom of toys, there are still risks. Assume that one import country improves some toy import standards that our export toy enterprises don’t conform to, the whole batches of this export toys are certain to suffer losses. Therefore, to avoid this situation, the toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region should try to develop diversified potential export market to prevent themselves from suffering unnecessary losses.

3.4 Lack of Standardized Supervision
Owing to the small production scale of toy industry in Pearl River Delta Region, there are some difficulties for administrative authorities to supervise to a certain degree. Moreover, the legal regulations of our country are still not so perfect. It is hard to formulate a series of unified standardized supervision procedure which may promote the health development of toy industry. For instance, in 2009, Guangdong Inspection and Quarantine Bureau has issued a document which requires each extended departments to have strict inspection supervision of the plasticiser item of export toys, in order to meet the requirements of national limits on the plasticiser and the area requirements of the importing country.

4. Impact of TBT from the Occident on Toy Industry
4.1 Impact Factors
Xia Youfu (2005:19) said, “Technical Barriers to Trade(TBT) means some mandatory or voluntary technical measures for the reason that a country or regional organizations aim to protect its essential security, protect the health and safety and life of human and animal and plant, protect the environment, prevent the fraud, ensure the product quality, etc. ”
Particularly, to synthesize the current situation and existing problems of toy industry in Pearl River Delta Region, the impact factor of TBT from the Occident in this region can mainly summarize as two factors, one is technical regulation and the other is conformity assessment procedure.

4.1.1 Technical Regulations
Sun Jingshui (2005:32) defined technical regulations as to the technical documents that should be compulsory executed of the technical regulations related to product characteristics or their related processes and production methods, which conclude laws and regulations; orders, decisions and regulations issued by government; and non-government institutions, such as the technical specifications, guidelines, criteria and instructions formulated by industry associations, etc.
According to the relevant regulations of EU, once the defective or potential safety hazard of toys to be found in the market of member states, EU will issue an alert notification about the unsafe products within the EU through the rapid reporting system. And it will order manufacturers, importers or retailers to recall or evacuate the relevant products from the market, and then prohibit this products to be resold to a third country beyond EU.

4.1.2 Conformity Assessment Procedures
Sun Jingshui (2005:33) considered conformity assessment procedures mean any direct or indirect programs to determine whether the products meet the requirements of the technical regulations or technical standards. TBT agreement provides the conformity assessment procedures that include sampling, testing and inspection, evaluation, verification and assurance of conformity, registration, accreditation and approval as well as other combinations. Generally believed that conformity assessment procedures consist of three components which are certification, accreditation and mutual recognition.
On July 22,1993, the European Community(EC) announced “EC Council No.93/68/CEE Directive”. According to this directive, during the process of production and before the launch to the market, any toy must comply with the safety standard or “basic requirements” set by the relevant directives of the EU. For example, before the launch to the market, the manufacturers or its agents in the EU must affix the mark of “CE” on the toys, which indicates that this products comply with the EU directive requirements.

4.2 Impact Aspects
Impact of TBT from the Occident on toy industry of Pearl River Delta Region mainly embodies in the following four aspects. They are export restriction, recalled in batches of products, increased production costs and reputation damage. Next, we will have a specific analysis of each affected aspect.

4.2.1 Export Restriction
China is the world toy export superpower and its annual export volume is 50 billion dollars, accounting for more than 50% of the world’s total. However, in recent years, the toy exports of Pearl River Delta Region has a downturn trend.
Compared with the developed countries, technical regulations and technical standards in China have lagged behind. Nowadays, the United States has 55 kinds certification system and European Union has 9 kinds unified certification system, but China has not yet formed a unified certification system. About 70% to 80% of China’s toy industry sta