From : Huxley, Olwen
Sent : Monday, May 9, 2005 6:39 PM
To : Lawrence Kogan
Subject : RE: L. Kogan // information// Follow-up
We usually get a transcripts a few days after, and after a laborious editing process which takes a truly unreasonable amount of time, we have the transcripts ready. Couple of weeks?
OH Olwen F. M. Huxley
Subcommittee on Environment, Technology, and StandardsHouse Science Committee
2320 Rayburn HOBWashington, DC 20515
ph. (202) 225-8844fx. (202) 225-4438
-----Original Message-----
From: Lawrence Kogan [mailto:ssbs_llc@msn.com]
Sent: Monday, May 09, 2005 6:37 PM
To: Huxley, Olwen
Subject: RE: L. Kogan // information// Follow-up
Thank you for sending it. How long after this hearing will the transcripts be available to the public - posted to Committee's website? Have a good evening.
Lawrence A. Kogan
President
Sound Science Business Strategies, LLC
1625 K Street, NWWashington, DC 20006
(C) 609-658-7417 (F) 452-8160
___________________________________
From: "Huxley, Olwen" Olwen.Huxley@mail.house.gov>
To: Lawrence Kogan ssbs_llc@msn.com>
Subject: RE: L. Kogan // information>
Date: Mon, 9 May 2005 17:33:06 -0400>
Hi - I owe you some stuff.
Just so you know, the hearing is now scheduled for 2 pm on Wednesday, rather than 10 am.
Here's the list of witnesses:
Dr. Hratch Semerjian is the Acting Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).
Mr. Joe Bhatia is the Vice President for International Operations at>Underwriters Laboratory (UL). UL is a commercial laboratory company that tests products against U.S. and international standards, headquartered in Northbrook, Illinois.
Dr. Don Deutsch is the Vice President for Standards Strategy and Architecture for Oracle, headquartered in Redwood Shores, California.
Mr. David Karmol is the Vice President of Public Policy and Government Affairs at the American National Standards Institute (ANSI).
Mr. Robert W. Noth is the Manager of Engineering Standards for Deere & Company, headquartered in Moline, Illinois.
Here are the questions:
Dr. Hratch Semerjian, Acting Director, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Briefly describe how NIST supports standards development and answer the following questions:
1. What is NIST's role in the international standards arena?
2. Describe the Department of Commerce's standards document "Standards and Competitiveness: Coordinating for Results" and the status of the implementation of its recommendations. What remains to be done?
3. How would NIST's FY 2006 budget request improve the U.S. position with respect to standards development? Describe any other NIST standards initiatives that would contribute to the competitive position of U.S. industry.
>-----Original Message----->
From: Lawrence Kogan [mailto:ssbs_llc@msn.com]
Sent: Friday, May 06, 2005 10:48 AM
To: Huxley, Olwen
Subject: RE: L. Kogan // information
Ms. Huxley:
I am looking forward to receiving you witness list and list of questions for next week's hearing.
Also, my co-director and I would like to know how long after the hearing may we provide 'for the record' comments?
Sincerely,
Lawrence A. Kogan
President
Sound Science Business Strategies, LLC
1625 K Street, NW Washington, DC 20006 (C) 609-658-7417 (F) 452-8160
From: "Huxley, Olwen" Olwen.Huxley@ mail.house.gov
To: Lawrence Kogan ssbs_llc@msn. com
Subject: RE: L. Kogan // information
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2005 17:52:17 -0400
These are all very interesting points that you raise, and they aren't the first time I have heard them.
I would be pleased to meet with you and your co-director. I would suggest Friday of next week, since we have a mark-up on Thursday and everything that happens prior to that will be necessarily mark-up related. If Friday doesn't work for you, we can do it the week after.
OH
Olwen F. M. Huxley
Subcommittee on Environment, Technology, and Standards
House Science Committee
2320 Rayburn HOB
Washington, DC 20515
ph. (202) 225-8844 fx. (202) 225-4438
-----Original Message-----
From: Lawrence Kogan [ mailto:ssbs_llc@msn. com]
Sent: Thursday, April 28, 2005 1:56 PM
To: Huxley, Olwen
Subject: L. Kogan // information
Dear Ms. Huxley:
Please find attached comments I submitted on Monday, April 18, 2005, in response to the recently revised U.S. Standards Strategy drafted by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). There are also attached weblinks to several papers I have prepared on the subject of EHS regulations and standards being used by the EU as disguised trade barriers.
As you are aware, ANSI is the U.S. National Representative to two ostensibly private non-governmental international standards bodies (the International Organization for Standardization [ISO] and the International Electrotechnical Commission [IEC] that are expressly referenced within the WTO TBT Agreement). The ISO/IEC are charged with developing relevant science and technology-based performance and use orientated international product standards that national governments are supposed to look to prior to enacting national regulations. In fact, with the help of the EU and the UN, the ISO is now in the business of developing food safety and medical device technical standards as well as corporate social responsibility standards. It may eventually get involved in some type of pharma standards, as the WHO isone of many UN agencies that serve as liaison organizations to the ISO.
As you will notice, my comments were prepared in the name of a new NJ-based NGO (a 501(c)(3) charitable, educational, and scientific organization)I have formed with a former European/ UN diplomat that is called: The Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development (ITSSD).
ITSSD's comments reflect how the EU has skillfully and systematically linked international regulation and standardization, and injected precautionary principle and environment-centric sustainable norms into the international standards development process. The ITSSD believes that ANSI's inability to detect this phenomenon has created serious vulnerabilities that have adversely impacted the U.S. negotiating position at the ISO/IEC. The ITSSD believes that, given the linkage noted above, this has also created serious vulnerabilities for the U.S. government's negotiating positions at the various WTO-relevant intergovernmental bodies in which different U.S. agencies participate. These include the Codex, the IPPC, the OECD and the UN (FAO, WHO, UNEP & CSD, as well as, others - Global Compact Office, UNDP, UNCTAD, UNIDO, etc.).
Perhaps, ITSSD can render assistance to the House Committee on Science in elaborating upon how its comments to the ANSI relate to the China standards issues now being looking into by the Ways and Means Committee...
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http://www.allbusiness.com/manufacturing/3900831-1.html
Olwen Huxley, a professional staff aide on the House Science Committee's subcommittee on environment, technology and standards,...
Publication: Manufacturing & Technology News Date: Monday, March 12 2007
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[THE FOLLOWING DOCUMENTS CONSIST OF: 1) A JUNE 2005 LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL TO THE FORMER CHAIR OF THE HOUSE SCIENCE COMMITTEE OF THE POST-HEARING TESTIMONY PREPARED BY THE ITSSD'S CEO; and 2) EXTRACTS OF SAID TESTIMONY].
http://www.itssd.org/Correspondences/ITSSDlettertoHouseSubcommChairEhlers.pdf
June 3, 2005
The Honorable Vernon J. Ehlers,
Michigan, Chairman
House Science Committee,
Subcommittee on Environment, Technology, and Standards
2320 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Dear Mr. Ehlers,
Please find attached ‘post-hearing’ testimony that we have prepared for submission to the Subcommittee on Environment, Technology and Standards in connection with the recent hearing on Standards that took place on May 11, 2005. We would appreciate your Subcommittee’s inclusion of this testimony within the official ‘hearing record’.
The Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development, Inc. is an independent and nonpartisan not-for-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of a positive global paradigm of sustainable development consistent with World Trade Organization (WTO) principles. We have undertaken considerable research and public outreach activities to highlight the increasing use of disguised regulatory trade barriers cast in the form of overly stringent environment, health and safety regulations and standards that are justified by reference to the need to achieve ‘sustainable development’. We have both observed and analyzed how such measures have increasingly threatened U.S. products and technologies and the science and intellectual property rights-based legal and economic frameworks which are critical to maintaining U.S. global competitiveness in the future.
We thank you for the opportunity to submit this testimony, and we remain at your
Subcommittee’s disposal should it be interested in speaking with us further about these issues.
Very truly yours,
Lawrence A. Kogan, Esq.
CEO
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http://www.itssd.org/Correspondences/LKogan-ITSSDtestimony-6-3-05-HouseScienceComm.pdf
Europe, China and the Use of Standards as Trade Barriers How Should the U.S. Respond?
Lawrence A. Kogan, CEO, Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development, Inc.
House Science Committee, Subcommittee on Environment, Technology, and Standards
June 3, 2005
Mr. Chairman, and ranking members of the Subcommittee, my name is Lawrence Kogan, and I am CEO and Co-Director of the Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development, Inc. (ITSSD). The ITSSD is an independent and non-partisan not-for-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of a positive paradigm of sustainable development consistent with World Trade Organization (WTO) principles. The ITSSD is pleased and honored to comment about the subtle, complex and significant challenge posed to U.S. global economic and technological competitiveness by the growing use of new market access barriers. During the past several years, it has become more obvious that such disguised trade barriers are typically cast as overly stringent and extra-territorial environment, health and safety (EHS) technical regulations and product and process standards, which have the effect of protecting underdeveloped, lagging or ailing industries in other countries.
Our research has revealed that most such measures are premised on an evolving European norm known as the precautionary (‘better safe than sorry’) principle. As employed by the European Union (EU) the precautionary principle severely restricts or altogether bans the introduction of a number of new and existing U.S. products, substances, processes and technologies into the marketplace, unless they have first satisfied rigorous pre-market authorization requirements that are in excess of relevant international standards, but which are not scientifically, economically or technically justified. Once permitted into the marketplace, they are then subject to overly stringent post-market testing requirements that are also in excess of relevant international standards. In addition to ignoring free market principles, such rules arguably also violate the terms of three WTO agreements: the Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Agreement; the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Agreement; and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (1994).
As requested, my testimony will respond to the following two sets of questions posed by the Subcommittee to the list of witnesses that testified during the May 11, 2005 hearing:
1. What has been China's and Europe's approach to the development and use of standards? How is this approach changing international standards development in organizations such as the International Standards Organization, and through bilateral relations with other countries? What are the implications for U.S. trade with China and the rest of the world?
2. Based on the U.S. Standards Strategy that ANSI has been developing, what should the Federal Government, States, U.S. standards development organizations, and companies be doing to reduce their vulnerability to the use of standards as trade barriers, and how could they promote the adoption of non-exclusionary standards in the global marketplace? How should these efforts be coordinated?....
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