Autonomous Vehicle Standards under the Technical Barriers to Trade Agreement

Abstract

Following the highlight of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO’s) 2018 World Trade Report regarding how artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to “increase efficiency in the production of goods and services,” former WTO Director-General Roberto Azevêdo, in his official capacity, claimed that technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT), AI, and connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs) have the potential to profoundly transform “the way we trade, who trades and what is traded.” This chapter focuses on CAVs as a case study to explore the question of how to modernize the Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) Agreement in the age of AI. Cars have been driving themselves in science fiction films and TV shows for decades. If you’ve ever dreamed of owning a car like KITT of Knight Rider, your dream is about to come true. Fitted with cameras, sensors, and communication systems, CAVs are able to learn from each other and to see, hear, think, and make decisions just like human drivers do.Driving automation can refer to a broad range of vehicle technologies and uses. A general concept of CAVs, as defined in policy papers, is “vehicles that are capable of driving themselves without being controlled or monitored by an individual for at least part of a journey.” CAVs have been 1 World Trade Organization, “World Trade Report 2018: The Future of World Trade – How Digital Technologies Are Transforming Global Commerce” (2018), https://perma.cc/F6SR-3XCW, at 3–6. 2 R Azevêdo, “The Global Trading System Today Is More Important Than Ever” (The Permanent Mission of Japan to the International Organizations in Geneva, 3 April 2018), https://perma.cc/5GPXU3QG. 3 Knight Riderwas a popular TV series that aired onNBC from 1982 to 1986. It featured KITT, whichwas an artificially intelligent car. 4 CAVs may be able to communicate with their occupants, other vehicles, road users, and all Internetbased applications. CAVs are equipped with an algorithm that processes data regarding what is right, wrong, safe, and unsafe for the car to perform. See C Skinner,Digital Human: The Fourth Revolution of Humanity Includes Everyone (Singapore, Marshall Cavendish Business, 2018), at 117–121. 5 See generally “Publications” (SAE International), https://perma.cc/8XFJ-PCXZ. 6 “Automated Vehicles” (Law Commission), https://perma.cc/3NAK-HPW3.