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Sustainable Tradefor a Living PlanetReforming the World Trade Organisation

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WWF InternationalAvenue du Mont-BlancCH-1196 GlandSwitzerland

WWF aims to conserve nature and ecological processes by:

• preserving genetic, species and ecosystem diversity• ensuring that the use of renewable natural resources is sustainable

both now and in the longer term, for the benefit of all life on Earth• promoting actions to reduce to a minium pollution and the

wasteful exploitation and consumption of resources and energy.

WWF’s ultimate goal is to stop, and eventually reverse, the accelerating degradation of our planet’s natural environment, and to help build afuture in which humans live in harmony with nature.

Sustainable Trade for a Living Planet

WWF International

Coordinator: Mikel Insausti, WWF-EPO

Text: Tony Snape and WWF Network

Editor: Peter Denton, WWF-UK

Design: the (design) pod

Any reproduction in full or in part of this document must mention the title and credit WWF International as the copyright owner.

Photographs only to be used with permission from copyright owners.

Dear Friend,

Over the past quarter of a century, our planet has lost some 30 per cent of its natural wealth. Forest,freshwater and marine ecosystems have been degraded by human activities such as logging, agriculture and fishing, and pollution has increased to the point where it threatens the stability of our global climate.

During the same period, world trade has grown exponentially. Indeed, its volume today is 14 times greater thanit was in 1950. International trade is growing at twice the pace of other economic activities, and is thus havingan ever greater influence on human welfare and the environment.

In short, governments have done a much better job creating a global marketplace than protecting the globalenvironment. It is also becoming apparent that in some instances trade liberalisation has widened the gapbetween rich and poor. Cases are also multiplying where the livelihoods of indigenous people are beingundermined by resource exploitation associated with liberalised international trade.

Towards the end of 1999, ministers from the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) 135 member governments are to meet in Seattle to decide on a new round of negotiations aimed at further liberalising world trade. If we areto protect nature, our common welfare and the future of our children, it is vital we ensure that environmentalprotection and sustainable development feature at the centre of this new round of trade negotiations.

This WWF Information Pack is designed to explain the link between trade, the environment and the need tobuild a sustainable world economy. Should you wish to play a part in reshaping international trade to protectthe future of us all, it also offers some ideas for action.

Unless we achieve reform of the WTO, the international trading system will continue to undermine rather thansupport sustainable development. Please help us to turn the current conflict between trade, environment anddevelopment policies into a fruitful partnership.

Yours sincerely,

Dr Claude MartinDirector General, WWF International

Sustainable Trade for a Living PlanetReforming the World Trade Organisation

Sustainable Trade for a Living PlanetReforming the World Trade Organisation

Trade matters!

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During the same period, biodiversity hasdeclined, pollution has increased and many ofthe world’s natural resources have been seriouslydepleted. It is estimated that since 1970, some30 per cent of the planet’s natural wealth hasbeen lost, due to trends such as increasinggreenhouse gas emissions, deforestation, soilerosion and overfishing. At the same time thegap between the poorest fifth of the worldpopulation and the richest fifth has wideneddramatically.

Thus, the world has created an open globalmarket, but not one that is yet producingsustainable outcomes for the world’senvironment, or for many of its poorestcommunities. As international commercebecomes an increasingly important force shaping our lives, how we trade and investacross borders has profound implications for the health of our planet.

Trade liberalisation has been made possible by a series of world agreements to remove tradebarriers. These began after the Second World War with the creation of GATT, the GeneralAgreement on Tariffs and Trade, and in 1995 theyled to the setting up of the far more powerfulWorld Trade Organisation (WTO). The WTO’s 135member governments are meeting in Seattle atthe end of 1999 to launch a new round of tradeliberalisation negotiations.

This will include proposals for the liberalisationof environmentally sensitive sectors, such as the timber and fisheries industries. And thenegotiations may for the first time extend WTOrules into important economic areas such asforeign investment, competition policy andgovernment procurement. While tradeagreements do offer new freedoms tomultinational corporations, they can also imposesharp limits on the ability of governments toregulate trade and other non-trade issues suchas environmental protection.

These new talks are of concern to developingcountries too, because until now it has beenmainly the rich nations that have benefited fromtrade liberalisation. A study by the World Bankpredicted that, while the GATT Uruguay Roundagreements would increase world GDP by $200billion (one per cent), sub-Saharan Africancountries could end up being worse off by losingtheir preferential tariff agreements with thericher countries.

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100 = index 19701980

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1990

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1975For the past

50 years, the

volume of world

trade has grown

an average six per

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It is now 14 times

the level it was

in 1950, due in

large part to the

elimination of

trade barriers such

as import tariffs,

quotas and other

restrictions.

Global biodiversity has declined by almost athird in the last 25 years – driven mainly byhuman activities

Death in the Murray-Darling Basin

Reform of agricultural policies will be a key issue in the newround of WTO negotiations. While many farm policies, such as the European Union’s Common Agricultural Policy, lead to significant environmental damage, piecemeal reform aimed mainly at increasing trade flows is unlikely to benefitthe environment.

Australia and other major agricultural producers are pushingfor the EU to open up its markets to more imports and phaseout its $50 billion subsidies for home-grown produce. Whilereform of the EU’s agricultural subsidies, if carefully designed,could yield important environmental benefits inside the EU,there are major environmental implications outside the EU too.

In anticipation of improved market access in Europe and other regions of the world, Australia is clearing extensivetracks of native vegetation and irrigating land in the Murray-Darling Basin.

Clearing native vegetation is the single largest threat toAustralia’s biodiversity and will lead to the depletion of soilfertility and groundwater resources.

Intensive irrigation of export crops has drained river flows,placing aquatic environments and species under severe stress.Soil erosion and salinisation have rendered large tracts ofAustralian agricultural land wholly unproductive.

This does not mean that European agricultural subsidies shouldnot undergo environmental impact assessment and majorreform. But it does mean that policies to promote sustainableagricultural practices will have to be made central elements ofthe WTO negotiations on agriculture, if they are to yield realbenefits globally and increase agricultural export opportunitiesfor developing countries.

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Trade policy and WTO rules also matter to theenvironment. Changes in prices of traded goodsand removal of trade barriers generally influenceproduction and consumption patterns. Thesechanges can be good or bad for the environmentand sustainable development. For example, thetrade rules themselves can directly influenceenvironmental policy-making by treatingenvironmental regulations as “barriers to trade”,and removing or weakening them.

The shrimp-turtle dispute, settled by a WTOcourt, was a classic case in point. Tens ofthousands of migratory sea turtles die every yearas they get caught up in shrimp fishing nets thatare not fitted with TEDs – turtle excluder devices.

The United States put in place a law prohibitingUS fishermen from using nets without TEDs. In1996, in an attempt to conserve the turtleswhich are protected under internationalconservation agreements, this ban was extendedto all countries exporting shrimps to the US.

Some Asian governments took the case to a WTOdispute panel, which interprets WTO rules. Whilethe WTO has the power to exempt free traderules for conservation reasons (Article XX), thepanel ignored the relevant internationalconservation agreements and ruled that the US ban was illegal.

World trade has grown exponentially since 1950,faster than any other economic activity.Source: WTO Annual Report 1998 WTO, Geneva

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Timber from the Solomon Islands

The export of timber is the key to the economy of the SolomonIslands, accounting for 42 per cent of its total export earnings.Unless harvesting levels are substantially reduced, however,this important resource could be depleted within 15 years.

There is increasing pressure on the remaining productiveforests as Asian companies, facing high demand and decreasingsupply in domestic markets, seek new sources of timber.

Since 1993, a number of organisations have begun workingwith local communities to develop alternative means ofgenerating long-term livelihoods from their forest resources.

They are seeking to profit from the interest of Europeanconsumers in forest conservation – using certification schemessuch as the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) that identifysustainably-produced timber. As well as protecting theenvironment, these schemes enable producers to earn a decent livelihood.

Yet WTO rules contained in the Technical Barriers to TradeAgreement could lead to such schemes being challenged in the WTO’s court. Some WTO members are already pushing toincrease the chances of such challenges. The next round of WTOnegotiations must safeguard certification schemes which helpconserve forests and enable local people to benefit from themeconomically.

After an appeal by the US, the WTO finallyacknowledged the potential of such a traderestriction to protect the environment, but it stilljudged the American action illegal, ruling infavour of free trade over the environment.

All of which begs the question: if Article XXcannot protect these endangered andinternationally protected species, what can itprotect? Under what circumstances will the WTOgive priority to the protection of the environmentover market deregulation?

The bottom line is that the WTO is failing to fulfil the mandate contained in the preamble to its own charter: to promote trade that isenvironmentally responsible and that encouragessustainable development.

While trade is a necessary part of many people’slivelihoods, it can also cause environmentaldestruction, deplete natural resources and resultin the inequitable distribution of wealth andpower. The challenge in the next WTO round willbe to define rules to ensure that trade and tradeliberalisation not only broadly benefit people andthe planet, but also support sustainabledevelopment.

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Sustainable Trade for a Living PlanetReforming the World Trade Organisation

Turning problemsinto opportunities

An inherent danger lies in implementing wide-ranging trade agreements without first assessingtheir likely social and environmental consequences.If it is to promote sustainable development, thisis a balance that the WTO must restore in anyfuture trade negotiations.

This need is well illustrated by the case of tradeliberalisation in Mexico’s corn sector through theNorth American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).The lack of a proper social and environmentalimpact assessment, before the agriculturalchapter of NAFTA was signed, led to an under-estimation of the effects of the agreement.

Trade liberalisation of Mexico’s agriculturalsector was part of a broader package of nationaleconomic and social reforms, including changes inland tenure laws and price support mechanisms.NAFTA’s agricultural chapter magnified thenegative impacts of some of these reforms onthe incomes and social conditions of farmers and rural workers.

The agreement opened Mexico’s market to USexports with a 15-year transition period. However,this was prematurely completed (in 30 months)and domestic prices plummeted in a context of overall economic stagnation and drasticreduction in public expenditure on agriculture.

The irony is that following the agreement, allcategories of farmers have increased cornproduction as they attempt to compensate for falling revenues and lack of economicopportunities. Commercial growers now relymore on intensive farming methods, while poorerproducers depend on expanding the cultivatedsurface under deteriorating productionconditions. Resource management capability is diminishing, and is leading to greaterdeforestation, soil erosion and the loss of genetic resources.

It is clear that there should have been a detailedimpact assessment before import restrictionswere dropped in the Mexican corn sector. Thereshould also have been a slower introduction ofthe import schedule and the prior establishmentof sufficient funds for income support andtechnical assistance.

As the Mexican example illustrates, tradeliberalisation does not occur in a vacuum.Effective environmental and social policies needto be in place before rushing into liberalisation.Ignoring this basic principle can lead toincreased poverty and environmentaldegradation.

The Mexican corn crisisN

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Nearly a quarter of the world’s fishing industryrevenues are handouts from governments.Subsidies on this scale are a leading cause ofoverfishing across the planet.

Indeed, recent research by WWF estimates thatthe world’s fishing fleet is two and a half timesthe size needed to achieve a catch that will notdeplete fish stocks.

Mauritania and other developing countries havesigned access agreements with the EU whichallow subsidised European fishing boats intotheir waters. Mauritania has a rich and diversemarine environment, but its revenues fromfishing – 13 per cent of gross national product –are decreasing as the industry privatises andEuropean boats buy up licences to fish theoffshore waters.

The large European industrial boats generally fail to land the fish locally, so the developingcountries do not benefit from the sale of therights. In addition, local processing industriesface high tariffs on fish product exports to theEU, further decreasing income earned bydeveloping countries.

Until recently, the EU also had a fishingagreement with Argentina. EU vessels had beenallowed to catch 120,000 tonnes of Argentina’smain fishery resource, the hubbsi hake, everyyear under an accord that dates back to 1992. Inthe past two years, the stock of this species hasbeen depleted by a third. The agreement expiredin May 1999 and Argentina has suggested that it may not be renewed.

Fishing subsidies have been the focus ofincreased attention from bodies such as the WTO and the Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO).

The WTO should cooperate with otherinternational bodies such as UNEP and the FAO in developing new international rules on the use and administration of fisheries subsidies.National governments should phase out harmfulsubsidies and increase transparency in theirfishery subsidy regimes.

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Two of the most recent WTO agreements make it more difficult for countries to set high foodsafety standards, in accordance with localconsumer preferences, without being broughtbefore the organisation’s dispute panels.

Application of the Technical Barriers to Trade(TBT) Agreement and the Agreement on Sanitaryand Phytosanitary Measures – settled at the endof the GATT Uruguay Round – limit governments’efforts to provide adequate labelling on foodproducts and to apply precautionary safetymeasures in the case of food production usingnew technologies.

This was demonstrated by two recenttransatlantic disputes, one concerning aEuropean ban on US beef containing hormones,the other about European food labelling – oreco-labelling – requirements.

While the EU’s risk assessment procedures werenot completed before it banned the import of UShormone-treated beef, the case raised importantquestions about the effect of WTO rules onapplication of the precautionary principle. Thisprinciple states that where there is a possiblerisk to human health or the environment, aregulator is entitled to act in the absence ofclear scientific proof in order to protect the public.

The EU has banned the import of US hormone-treated beef until it is proved that hormones donot pose a health risk. The US took the EU to theWTO dispute panel and argued that the measureconstituted protectionism, given that insufficientscientific evidence was available. In early 1999,the WTO ruled that the EU should lift theprohibition on the grounds that it formed abarrier to trade. The WTO panel decided that theprecautionary principle could not be applied untilthe risk assessment was complete.

Should there be conflicting scientific evidence onthe safety of hormone-treated beef, it is not clearthat the WTO would recognise the precautionaryprinciple and thereby give human health and the

environment the benefit of the doubt. Yet theprecautionary principle is widely accepted as oneof the keys to reducing health or environmentalrisk. Provided it is not an excuse for protectionistabuse, it should be clearly recognised as such bythe WTO.

European countries, along with Australia, Braziland New Zealand, have also been criticised bythe US and Canada for their plans to labelgenetically modified foods. The North Americancountries have tabled papers in closed-door WTOcommittee meetings, claiming that the labelsconstitute a technical barrier to trade and thuscontravene WTO rules.

If this is the case, a WTO dispute panel coulddeprive the public of its right to have accurateinformation displayed on the content and originof the food it selects in shops and supermarkets.Labelling of popular, eco-friendly timber products– such as the Forest Stewardship Council’scertification scheme for sustainably-producedtimber – could also come under attack unless itis made clear that WTO rules give consumers theright to be accurately informed about theproducts they consume.

How much do you know about what you eat?

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Reform the WTO

Sustainable Trade for a Living PlanetReforming the World Trade Organisation

Towards the end of

1999, trade

ministers from the

135 member

countries of the

WTO are to meet

in Seattle to

discuss launching a

new round of

international trade

negotiations,

dubbed by some

the Millennium

Round.

This new round offers a unique opportunity for the global community to forge a closerrelationship between trade, the environment and sustainable development.

The trouble with present global trade rules andprocedures is that they were established purelywith commercial interests in mind, rather than abalanced view of the general public good. WWFbelieves that the WTO system has now evolvedto the stage where it is pursuing tradeliberalisation as an end in itself, leavingenvironmental and social values behind. Theresult is that there is a broad feeling in bothNorth and South that the WTO is not respondingto the priorities of sustainable and equitableglobal development.

The UN recognises that globalisation of themarketplace is proceeding at “breakneck speedand with amazing reach”1. The time has come totake stock of its implications. The goal has to beto create sustainable livelihoods and markets, tohusband resources and prevent pollution.

To achieve this, the WTO needs to undergo aseries of reforms – but it must be understoodthat the WTO is not the only answer. Broadpublic support for market liberalisation willdepend on real advances in a larger agenda. Thismust address the needs of poorest people and ofa healthy environment, and involve other

international bodies such as the United NationsEnvironment and Development Programmes(UNEP and UNDP) and the UN Conference onTrade and Development (UNCTAD).

Rather than press ahead with more rapid tradeliberalisation, WTO members need to seek ahealthier path towards world prosperity. WWFhas identified five key elements of necessaryreform:

1 WTO members should undertake acomprehensive assessment of theenvironmental and social impacts of thepresent trade system, and of any proposals for further liberalisation;

2 The WTO should reform specific rules, and in particular must fully respect the authorityand rules of international conservation andenvironmental agreements such as theConventions on Climate Change and Biological Diversity;

3 WTO members should ensure that tradeliberalisation is accompanied by improvedenvironmental rules and other policies neededto create a sustainable market;

4 WTO members should prioritise tradeliberalisation measures that would deliverdirect and immediate benefits to theenvironment, thereby generating win-winscenarios; and

Transparency, accountability anddemocratic control

Unlike procedure at the United Nations,environmental and other public interestgroups are not allowed to observe WTOdiscussions, even when commerciallyvaluable secrets are not at stake. WTOcommittees conduct their businessbehind closed doors and they often evenrefuse to make meeting agendas public.Many of the more influential WTOmember countries reject the concept ofmore transparency, especially wheredispute panels are concerned.

1 Human Development Report1999, United NationsDevelopment Programme

WTO decision-making

Poor countries have little say in WTOdecision-making. Of the 135 membercountries, 29 do not even have apermanent trade mission to the WTO.Without such representation in Geneva,many poor countries are rarely present at WTO meetings and have virtually noinfluence over the rules it makes. Ahandful of countries dominate and puttogether the final elements of new worldtrade agreements.

5 The WTO should avoid expanding its rules intoinvestment and other major new areas ofcommerce.

In addition, poorer countries’ participation inWTO decision-making must be enhanced to makeits trade agreements fair and to boost theeconomic development of those countries. Thisrequires:

• Supporting developing countries and leastdeveloped countries (LDCs) with the means tonegotiate effectively, to be represented at allWTO meetings that concern them, and to makeeffective use of its dispute settlementmechanism; and

• Promoting full and balanced collaboration withother international organisations working ontrade and sustainable development such asUNCTAD, UNEP and UNDP, which together canhelp construct policies to meet the specialneeds and conditions of developing countries.

True reform of the WTO also means making it a democratic, competent and transparentorganisation.

The development of national negotiatingpositions must be undertaken moredemocratically than at present. Nationalparliaments have a role in ensuring that abalance is kept between trade and other publicpolicy concerns, through close scrutiny of theirrespective governments’ trade policy-making.

Competency is not only about what the WTOdeals with, but also what it should not beallowed to deal with. The WTO should berestricted to core issues, respecting the mandatesof other international organisations (such asUNEP, international conservation agreements, theFood and Agriculture Organisation and the WorldHealth Organisation) and cooperating with themin their areas of competence.

Transparency must be increased not only in thenegotiating of trade agreements, but also inproviding public access to WTO documents and dispute resolution processes

Protecting MultilateralEnvironmental Agreements(MEAs)

The WTO has to fully respect legitimateenvironmental rules and agreementsunless they can be demonstrated to beprotectionist. This means the WTO mustclearly recognise the limits of itsjurisdiction over environmental questions.At the same time, the environment mustbe addressed within the WTO in atransparent way to prevent the kind ofsituation that occurred in the case of theUnited Nations’ Biosafety Protocol whichwas intended to govern the use andtrade in genetically-modified organismsand products. Negotiations on thisprotocol, a legal annex to the UNConvention on Biological Diversity, wereblocked by countries which claimed thatit would restrict trade and contraveneWTO rules.

Promoting environmentally and socially beneficial trade

One of the priorities in world trade todayis the need to reform fishery subsidies.The world’s fishing fleet – much of whichis maintained by national subsidies – isestimated to be as much as two and ahalf times the size needed to sustainablyharvest the oceans. The EU paysdeveloping countries more than $260million a year for its oversized fleet’sfishing rights. EU boats often processtheir fish on board, which means thatsome developing countries are deprivedof income from catches that wouldotherwise be landed in their harbours.The WTO could play a central role inhelping eliminate subsidies thatcontribute to overcapacity.

involving a sustainable development dimension.The public must be better able to see andunderstand what is being decided in the WTO,and how it is being decided.

Careful analysis and assessment of the effects of previous trade policy and agreements onsustainable development must shape thenecessary WTO reforms.

Sustainability assessments should be undertakenconcurrently with any new WTO negotiations sothat potential effects of would-be agreements onthe environment, poverty alleviation and societyin general are appraised before negotiations areconcluded.

A permanent mechanism to carry out suchassessments is necessary to give credibility tothe WTO’s stated goal of promoting sustainabledevelopment, and to ensure that it looks beforeit leaps.

To undertake sustainability assessmentsaccurately, there needs to be sufficientdeveloping country input and an appropriateinternational framework where differentexperiences can be shared. This requiresresources to help developing countries build thecapacity to perform adequate assessments.

Special and differentialtreatment for developingcountries

Future WTO negotiations should agreeactions to give favourable (“special anddifferential” ) treatment to developingcountries. WWF believes that a priorityfor such action is the Trade-RelatedIntellectual Property Rights (TRIPs)Agreement, which protects the rights ofpatent holders in international trade.Developing countries may need anextension of the current grace periodsthey are given to develop their ownintellectual property laws to suit theirneeds and conditions. Developedcountries should offer technical and legalassistance to developing countries sothat national laws to protect intellectualproperty over plants and animals can becreated. To promote technology transfer,WTO members should also agree onincentives to be offered by developedcountries to private enterprises allowingthe transfer of technology to leastdeveloped countries. Measurespreventing abuse of patents to restricttechnology transfer to developingcountries should also be agreed. Theseactions would reduce the potential forthe TRIPs Agreement to undermine theConvention on Biological Diversity.

The WTO must not be expandedinto areas where it has nocompetence

The dominant countries in the WTO areproposing to extend the organisation’scompetency to areas it has not previouslycovered. One such area, proposed by theEU and Japan, is investment – an areathat directly concerns sustainabledevelopment issues. In Namibia, forexample, local communities benefit undernational law from common access toresources to run tourism activities. Aworld investment agreement brokeredunder the WTO could challenge Namibianlaws, thus opening up the local tourismindustries to foreign bidders, bringing inforeign workers and displacing locallivelihoods. A more appropriateorganisation for supervising agreementsin this area would be UNCTAD, the UNConference on Trade and Development:its mandate is to promote developmentin poorer countries and it has greatertransparency than the WTO.

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Write to Members of Parliament, government trade ministers,or even your Prime Minister or President, and ask them to put the

environment first and trade later (see sample letter overleaf). Make surethat your parliament makes the government accountable for the positionit takes in WTO negotiations.

Visit WWF International’s website (www.panda.org) and pick up your Panda Passport to become a WTO reform activist.

Discuss the issues raised in this pack with any local groups to which you belong.

Join the "WTO Impact" e-mail list where relevant information on WTO processes is circulated daily by the International Coalition for

Development Action (subscribe by sending an e-mail to icda@skynet.be).

Keep yourself updated on trade and sustainable development issues by subscribing to the BRIDGES Monthly Review and the

Weekly News Digest (at www.ictsd.org), prepared by the InternationalCentre for Trade and Sustainable Development (ICTSD) in Geneva.

If you are not already a member, join WWF or another NGO working to place environmental protection and sustainable

development at the heart of the WTO agenda (membership information at www.panda.org).

Order more copies of this pack and have them sent directly to colleagues and people you think would be interested or

should know more about the WTO (send recipients’ addresses and your preferred language – English, Spanish, Russian or French – to fax numbers +41 22 3648219 in Geneva or +32 2 7438819 in Brussels).

Seven things you can do to help reform the WTO

Act now!

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Sustainable Trade for a Living PlanetReforming the World Trade Organisation

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Dear

I am sure you already know that the 135 members of the World Trade Organisationmeet in Seattle from 30 November to 3 December 1999 to decide on the agenda for a new round of talks to remove barriers to trade, and possibly investment.

As someone who cares about the wellbeing of our environment and of peopleeverywhere, I am increasingly concerned that environmental protection and sustainable development are being left behind in the rush to globalise trade.

The planetÕs natural resources have been substantially eroded over the past 40 years,even as market barriers have been reduced. Although trade liberalisation has helpedcreate more wealth, the gap between rich and poor countries is also widening.

It is vitally important that governments and parliaments ensure any furtherliberalisation of world trade is done in a way that supports sustainable developmentand alleviates poverty, while paying full respect to existing environmental protectionagreements and laws.

This next round of trade talks is a crucial opportunity to create harmony between WTO rules, policies for economic development and the increasingly urgent need toprotect the environment.

I look to you to reclaim trade policy for people and the planet by calling for:

¥ WTO members to undertake a comprehensive assessment of the environmental and social impacts of the current trade system, and of any proposals for furtherliberalisation;

¥ The WTO to make reforms of specific rules, and in particular to respect fully theauthority and rules of international conservation and environmental agreements;

¥ WTO members to ensure that trade liberalisation is accompanied by improvedenvironmental rules and other policies needed to create a sustainable market; and

¥ The WTO to avoid expanding its rules into investment and other major new areas of commerce.

When you see trade, please think environment. And please think people, local communities and what any agreement might mean for their future.

Yours faithfully,

Negotiations continue among WTOmember governments on what trade rules they want to change. Ensure yourgovernment puts the environment andsustainable development at the heart of its position

This is the time for parliaments toinfluence the negotiating mandates oftheir respective governments, and toensure that environmental and sustain-able development concerns have beenadequately addressed by them

1999 Seoul International Conference ofNGOs. Large NGO gathering aiming toassess the status of global developmentand map out a strategy for the newmillennium. Its conclusions will be relayedto the UN Millennium summit in New Yorkin September 2000. For information,contact the conference of NGOs (CONGO)at the United Nations, e-mail:mngo@bic.org

OECD workshop on the use ofenvironmental impact assessments inpredicting the consequences of worldtrade agreements (www.oecd.org/news_and_events/upcoming.htm)

Does your parliament have a WTOcommittee in place to oversee yourgovernment’s position in thesenegotiations?

The European Commission publishes thefirst set of results from its SustainabilityImpact Assessment of the next WTOnegotiating round. You can inform yourself and contribute your viewsthrough the following website(http://fs2.idpm.man.ac.uk/sia/)

WTO ministerial conference to discuss thepossibility of launching a new round ofnegotiations and an agenda for the talks

WTO negotiations start and are expectedto last three or four years

International experts’ meeting onsustainability assessment of tradeliberalisation, Ecuador (contact WWF at fax number +41 22 3648219 for furtherinformation)

Eighth session of United NationsCommission on Sustainable Developmentdiscusses trade, environment and the WTOas a special topic. The CSD is the bodyresponsible for following up the Rio Earth Summit.

October 1999

10-16 October1999

26-27 October 1999

November 1999

30 November - 3 December

1999

January2000

April 2000

Road to the 21st Century

Further reading

1 Building Sustainable Trade for People and the Environment,Experts Panel on Trade and Sustainable Development (EPTSD)Report, WWF International, March 1999 (download fromwww.panda.org)

2 Initiating an Environmental Assessment of Trade Liberalisationin the WTO, Discussion Paper, WWF International, March 1999(download from www.panda.org)

3 From Liberalisation to Sustainable Development; A Critique of the OECD Paper “Open Markets Matter: The Benefits of Trade and Investment Liberalisation”, WWF International, revised January 1999 (download fromwww.panda.org)

4 Dispute Settlement in the WTO: a crisis for sustainabledevelopment, Discussion Paper, WWF International, CIEL,CNI & OXFAM, May 1998 (download from www.panda.org)

5 Gender Focus on the WTO, International Coalition forDevelopment Action (ICDA), June 1999 (order from www.icda.be)

6 WTO and Food Security: Opportunities for Action, ActionAid(UK), January 1999 (order from www.actionaid.org)

7 Focus-on-Trade, a regular electronic bulletin providing updatesand interdisciplinary analysis on regional and global trade andfinance. It covers economic, ecological, political, gender and socialissues related to world trade. Managed by Focus on the GlobalSouth, Bangkok, Thailand. Subscribe at www.focusweb.org

8 The Environmental Effects of Trade, OECD, Paris, 1994.(download from www.oecd.org; select Free Documents and then Trade)

9 The World Trade Organisation and Sustainable Development:An independent Assessment, International Institute forSustainable Development (IISD), Winnipeg, 1996. (download fromwww.iisd.ca/trade)

10 International Trade and the Environment, Patrick Low, WorldBank Discussion Paper 159, World Bank, Washington DC, 1992.(order from www.worldbank.org)

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