VSS

September 17, 2018

Launch of the 3rd Flagship Report: Voluntary Sustainability Standards (VSS), Trade and Sustainable Development

3rd UNFSS Flagship Report: Voluntary Sustainability Standards (VSS), Trade and Sustainable Development   The relationship between Voluntary Sustainability Standards (VSS), trade and sustainable development are among the most pronounced concepts sought-after the realm of green global value chains. We typically see the benefits of imposing sustainability standards as a positive advantage contributing to the environment, social and the economy. The VSS system has in fact influence the export landscape to either facilitate market access or become an obstacle to trade, especially for importing countries that have turned to

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UNFSS at BioFach, February 2015, Nuremberg

The UNFSS Working Group on Enhancing Interoperability of Sustainability Standards takes special interest in scaling up equivalence among sustainability schemes. Equivalence is especially crucial in the organic sector, where governments regulate organic standards and trade, and can erect barriers to trade when applying these regulations to imports. Currently there are 13 bilateral equivalence arrangements among regulating countries. UNFSS took the opportunity at BioFach, the world’s largest international organic trade fair and Congress, to facilitate presentation and discussion

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April 9, 2015

UNFSS participation in events in India – 4th quarter 2014

The UNFSS was present at the following events in India in the last quarter of 2014: 29-30 October 2014 – Conference on Trade, Transport and Transit Facilitation in South Asia: Imperative of Bridging Macro-Meso-Micro Gaps between India and Bangladesh. The conference was held at the Hotel Lalit Great Eastern in Kolkata, India, and organised by CUTS International. Mr. Bhutani was a panellist in the session on Standards and Transport related Barriers to Trade Facilitation between Bangladesh and India.

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November 14, 2014

UNFSS at IFOAM Organic World Congress, Istanbul

  The UNFSS Working Group on enhancing interoperability of VSS focuses on organic agriculture as a sector that provides leading edge examples of innovation and impact of standards and technical regulations towards achieving environmental, social and economic goals. Organic agriculture and trade, which has come to be regulated by governments, now crucially depends on collaboration between those governments, the private sector and civil society. At the IFOAM Organic World Congress, held from 13-15 October 2014 in Istanbul and drawing

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October 24, 2014

UNFSS at the WTO Public Forum 2014

The UNFSS participated in a session of the WTO Public Forum 2014 under the topic “Voluntary Sustainability Standards: Building Equity in and Access to Sustainable Markets” on 3 October 2014 at the WTO headquarters, Geneva. The session was hosted by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) and the State of Sustainability Initiatives (SSI). Panelists included representatives from the UNFSS, the Sustainable Commodity Assistance Network (SCAN), Smallholders’ Access to Markets for Certified Sustainable

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UNFSS in CII/IISD Conference – New Delhi, India

UNFSS addresses CII/IISD Conference on Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement: Its Impact on India and Developing Nations in New Delhi, India on 12 August 2014. Ulrich Hoffmann, Coordinator of the UNFSS, was invited by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development to make a presentation on the importance of private sustainability standards for market access, their role as governance tool in international supply chains and their contribution to achieving specific sustainable

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June 25, 2014

UNFSS at ICCO’s World Cocoa Conference, Amsterdam

The UNFSS was presented at ICCO’s World Cocoa Conference in Amsterdam on June, 11th, 2014. This global conference for the cocoa sector brings together the governments from the cocoa producing and consuming countries, as well as a wide variety of stakeholders (over 1,200 registered attendees). The UNFSS presentation focused on the joint activities the UNFSS and ICCO had organized over the past year to address the issue of Voluntary Sustainability Standards in this important sector, which included

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December 20, 2013

Launching the annual reports of COSA and SSI, 30-31 January 2014

The UNFSS, in collaboration with the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs of Switzerland (SECO), the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research (MISTRA) and the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), will be organizing three short events on the occasion of the launch of the State of Sustainability Initiatives (SSI) Review 2014 and the First COSA Global Report on 30 and 31 January 2014. The events will

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