by Enrico Bilardo
This paper developed by the OECD’s Regulatory Policy Division analyses the role of the international regulatory co-operation (IRC) to deal with the COVID-19 crisis. The brief highlights how countries can together manage more effective and consistent response to the COVID-19 crisis, to ensure the resilience of supply chains and to maintain the interoperability of essential services through international regulatory co-operation.
IRC can help manage cross-border risks, developing collective action to fight common threats related to the spread of COVID-19 around the world. It is a support of the responses to the crisis. Indeed, the brief highlights how IRC can promote work sharing, mutual learning and pooling resources between governments. All these things are useful to maintain the availability of essential goods and to enable the interoperability of essential services, especially for cross-border activities.
The last part of the paper is focused on the need for an institutional set up for IRC. It describes the role of international organizations in support of information exchange and common regulatory approaches. This part also highlights how IRC needs a strong embedding in national regulatory frameworks, to build an efficient multilateral system, which can manage times of crisis with rapid action.