Adapting Your Goods to Local Market Regulations

What you'll learn:

• what local market regulations for products are
• the most common types of regulation you may encounter
• the impact of local market regulations on your export opportunities

What are local market regulations? Local market regulations for your products are any legislation set by governments, industries or regulatory bodies that controls how your goods can be traded on the market.

Product labelling regulations Your chosen market may have different regulations on labelling your product. For example, if your product is labelled 'organic' in the UK, you may not be able to label it the same way in your export market.

Product safety regulations These regulations are designed to ensure that your product is safe enough to be traded in a specific country, and they can vary between markets.

Environmental and health regulations There is a wide range of environmental and health regulations that can affect the export of your product. This can apply to every country your product passes through.

Food standards regulations Regulations on importing food products into different countries can vary significantly depending on the region and type of product.

Different liability insurance requirements The amount of liability insurance required to export your product to different markets can have a major impact on potential profitability.

Assessing the impact of local market regulations Understanding the regulations you may encounter in different markets, and obtaining the relevant accreditations needed to trade, can take a lot of time and resources.

You can carry out basic online research using the websites of the relevant regulatory bodies and tools such as the UK government's 'Check international trade barriers' service.

Your local Department for Business and Trade advisory team can put you in touch with in-country regulatory experts. They can also advise on potential grants or programmes available to help with your research.

There are many market regulations to consider, but 99 times out of 100 they are not a barrier. Make sure you have carried out proper research and due diligence.