7. The Secretariat informed the Coordinating Committee of the outcome of the 23rd Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission (Rome, June 1999), in particular the decisions of the Commission to establish the present Regional Coordinating Committee; changes to the Rules of Procedure to provide for the representation of the countries of the Near East on the Executive Committee of the Codex Alimentarius Commission, and to include Arabic as one of the Commission’s official working languages.
8. The Secretariat also noted that the Commission was in the process of developing its Medium-Term Plan for the period 2003-2007, based on the FAO Strategic Framework 2001-2015 and the WHO Resolution on Food Safety. It was expected that a draft of the Medium-Term Plan would be submitted to Member Governments for comment and that the draft and these comments would be discussed at the 24th Session of the Commission in July 2001. The Committee also noted that action had begun to implement the Commission’s recommendations for applying risk analysis to the standards-development process and the recommendations arising from the FAO Conference on Food Trade beyond 2000 (Melbourne, October 1999).
9. Several Delegations expressed their deep appreciation of the Commission’s decision to use Arabic as a working language, especially since this meant that the officially adopted texts of Codex Standards would be translated into Arabic. Nevertheless, the Secretariat noted that progress in this area was not as fast as had been expected and that at present only the texts dealing with food hygiene and the Procedural Manual had been translated, although other final texts would be translated as they became available. It was noted that financial constraints were inhibiting the definitive translation of the Codex texts. The Committee agreed to discuss possible solutions to this problem under Agenda Item 9 - Other Business.
10. Several questions were raised about the implications of organizing annual sessions of the Commission, as proposed in the Chairperson’s Action Plan, including the questions of holding annual sessions of all Codex Committees. The Secretariat pointed out that such a move could have serious cost implications for the budget of the Codex Alimentarius Commission and could impose additional costs on participating Member countries. It was recommended that the cost implications of holding annual sessions of Commission and Committee meetings be examined more fully, especially in view of the finalization of the biennial FAO Programme of Work and Budget.
11. The question of developing country participation at Codex meetings was also discussed, and it was generally agreed that developing country participation in Codex meetings at Committee level was not Representative of the Commission’s membership as a whole, although at the Commission itself developing country participation was relatively high. It was noted that Codex Committees and Task Forces were all open committees in which the full participation of all members of the Commission was possible, either directly or by correspondence at the various Steps of the Codex Step Procedure. The Coordinating Committee noted that discussions between the primary standards-setting bodies and the WTO were being undertaken to see what could be done to improve the situation. The Coordinating Committee called on FAO and WHO and other interested parties to take positive steps to improve the participation of developing countries at all steps in the Codex decision-making process.
12. In relation to the participation of experts from developing countries in the expert scientific advisory committees of FAO and WHO, the Coordinating Committee noted that efforts were being taken to ensure that the experts selected for these committees and consultations were Representative of all regions. The Representatives of FAO and WHO noted that the Organizations had recently called for expressions of interest from competent scientists for consideration as experts in various scientific panels with the intention of developing rosters of experts from all regions with the necessary scientific background and experience.
