Distributorship agreements are among the most frequently used means of organizing the distribution of goods in a foreign country and thus most exporters (whether large or small) must therefore face the problem of drafting an international distributorship contract.

To assist business people engaged in international trade (and the lawyers aiding them, in drafting and negotiating contracts), ICC first drew up the model contract on international distributorship in the early 1990s. It was among the first in a successful series of model contracts that now cover almost all types of agreements relating to distribution.

The model contract has now been revised for a second time, taking account of recent developments in the laws affecting distribution and also to ensure that the contract is in harmony with the other ICC model contracts.

Revision of this model contract was prepared by a dedicated working group on Agency and Distributorship under the auspices of the ICC Commission on Commercial Law and Practice, and was chaired by Fabio Bortolotti (Italy). The model benefited from the active participation of the following working group members: Horst Becker (Germany), Dragan Beljic (Serbia), Silvia Bortolotti (Italy), Madalena Caldeira (Portugal), José Maria Corrêa de Sampaio (Portugal), Arthur X. Dong (China), Juan Carlos Escallón (Colombia), Didier Ferrier (France), Andrej Friedl (Slovenia), Valle Garcia de Novales (Spain), Mariaelena Giorcelli (Italy), Bernhard Köck (Austria), Stephan Kranebitter (Austria), Galyah Natan-Epstein (Israel), Sven Petersen (Denmark), Christoph Martin Radtke (France), Olufunmilayo Ajike Roberts (Nigeria), Michael Svendsen (Denmark), Jaap van Till (Netherlands), Koen Vanheusden (Belgium), and Angelika Zoder (Austria).

As always, the ICC national committees around the world were instrumental in circulating drafts of this contract to their trading communities for comment. ICC Secretariat direction was provided by ICC Senior Policy Executive, Emily O’Connor (France).