ISLAMABAD, June 12: The government will announce amendments to the Harmonized System Nomenclature (HSN) during the upcoming budget.

Official sources told Dawn that amendments to the nomenclature will come into effect from July 1, 2002.

According to the official, the HS convention emphasized the importance of ensuring that the harmonized system was kept up to date in the light of changes in technology or in patterns of international trade.

Elaborating further, the official said that the current recommendation was in fact the second one to make major amendments since the harmonized system was approved by the council in 1983. The recommendation includes 372 sets of amendments.

The main sources of amendments made to the nomenclature were technological progress; trade patterns; clarification of texts to ensure uniform application; adaptation to the nomenclature to reflect trade practice.

It included amendments related to the social and environmental field — new sub-headings to facilitate the monitoring and control of: certain species covered by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Fauna and Flora (CITES); fish falling under the International Convention of Atlantic Tuna (ICCAT); specific categories of waste controlled by the Basel Convention and narcotic drugs and psychotropic falling within single convention on narcotic drugs (1961), as amended by the 1972 protocol and the 1971 convention on psychotropic substance.