31. The secretariat briefed GRE on the recent activities of the WP.29 Subgroup on UN Regulation No. 0 (IWVTA) and about the budgetary issues related to the development of an electronic database for the exchange of type approval documentation (DETA). GRB also noted that, in December 2016, the European Union had formally transmitted Revision 3 of the 1958 Agreement to the United Nations Office for Legal Affairs (OLA) and that its entry into force was scheduled for mid-September 2017.

32. GRE was informed that WP.29, at its November 2016 session, had requested GRE, in cooperation with IWG on IWVTA, to clarify the individual Regulations on lighting and light-signalling devices with a requirement that light sources in these devices should be type approved pursuant to Regulations Nos. 37, 99 or 128 (ECE/TRANS/WP.29/1126, para. 62). In line with this request, the expert from EC proposed collective amendments to device Regulations and to Regulation No. 48 (ECE/TRANS/WP.29/GRE/2017/7, Informal document GRE-77-30-Rev.1). Following an in-depth discussion, GRE adopted the proposals for amendments, as laid down in Annex IV, and requested the secretariat to submit them to WP.29 and AC.1 for consideration and vote at their June 2017 sessions.

33. The expert from EC reiterated the importance of the Unique Identifier (UI) and DETA for the simplified lighting and light-signalling Regulations (GRE-77-31). According to him, the grouping of a number of devices into a single Regulation is not compatible with the traditional approach of using one marking per series of amendments to the Regulation. Thus, he argued in favour of mandatory, rather than optional, use of UI. GRE concurred with his view, but noted that the use of UI is conditional upon the availability of DETA. The expert of GTB also pointed out the unclear interpretation of Schedule 5 to the Revised 1958 Agreement with regard to the obligatory use of UI and DETA.