Social issues: Labour, environment and human rights

Liberalizing Regional Trade Regimes Through AfCFTA: Challenges and Opportunities

“…92 Beyond this acknowledgement, however, there is no significant or successful incorporation of non-trade issues at the WTO level. 93 It is necessary to point out that developing countries often oppose the inclusion of non-trade issues in WTO negotiations because they consider it a ploy by developed countries to restrict access to their markets on account of their predicted failure to adhere to them. 94 However, with the promulgation of SDGs that partly impinge on international trade law, the interaction between trade and non-trade issues will come under wider scrutiny.…”

Regional Trade Agreements and Domestic Labour Market Regulation

“…Our third general remark concerns the many different approaches to labour provisions in trade agreements. Bartels (2009) provides an overview of the RTAs in force, showing that there is no clear pattern. Dawar (2008) underlines that, even among developed countries, the practice is far from being universal.…”

“…Other industrialised countries -except perhaps New Zealandare more reluctant. Bartels (2009) noted that Australia rejects such a linkage as a matter of principle; it has only in its FTAs with the USA ( 2005) and later with Chile ( 2009) accepted to insert a reference to labour standards; Japan and Switzerland seem to have similar views on the matter. These countries rarely include references to labour standards in their RTAs.…”

“…As we have seen in Section 2, Article 192 recognises the right of the CARICOM States "to regulate in order to establish their own social regulations and labour standards in line with their own social development priorities" -but it also obliges them to "provide for and encourage high levels of social and labour standards" and to "strive to" continue to improve those laws and policies 44 . However, implementation follows different avenues: (a) consultations, including with the ILO acting as an intermediary 45 (b) measures to combat child labour under the general exceptions clause in Article 224 used to protect public 42 See the Public Comments made in the context of the Four Year Review, published by the Secretariat of the Commission on Labor Cooperation, available at http://new.naalc.org/index.cfm?page=255 (accessed 30 April 2011) 43 Bartels (2009), p. 355. 44 Art.…”

International Trade Regulatory Challenges in Brazil: Some Lessons from the Promotion of Ethanol

“…In terms of the synchronicity between new strategies for development and international regulatory efforts, the regulation of trade after 1990 stressed three major points: (1) it was not limited to the regulation and diminishment of tariffs; (2) in addition to the regulation of areas connected stricto sensu to trade, it has also started to regulate areas that were related to trade; and (3) it has extended its regulation to areas closely related to the public policy of governments (Marceau & Trachtman, ; Ostry, ). These efforts have forged a new context of regulation of international trade, stipulating positive obligations to domestic regulation in a variegated set of areas (Abbott & Snidal, ; Bartels, , p. 355).…”