The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) hosted the annual meeting of the International Plant Protection Convention (IPPC) last week in Rome. As part of the meetings, the IGTC Secretariat updated governments on the Industry Advisory Group (IAG) and its efforts to address the interoperability of the IPPC electronic phytosanitary certification solution (ePhyto) with global trade flows of grains, seeds, horticulture, cut flowers, wood products, and more.

The event brought together more than 150 of the IPPC’s governmental contracting Parties which include phytosanitary authorities such as APHIS (USA), CFIA (Canada), KEPHIS (Kenya), SENASA (Argentina), SADER (Mexico), NPQS (Rep. of Korea), among many others.

IGTC has been elected as Chair of the ePhyto IAG and will hold the position until July 2020. A full report of the meeting has been sent to the IGTC’s Working on Electronic Trading Documentation.