ABSTRACT
Environmental activists in California succeeded in placing on a referendum what became known as Proposition 65. In essence, that proposition would have established a sanitary and phyto-sanitary regime unparalleled in the world. The famous “Tuna/Dolphin Case” was winding its way through the labyrinths of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT); about a year later, the GATT released its controversial decision on tuna/dolphin. Members of the International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium have seen firsthand the agonies of the agricultural trade negotiations. The founding fathers of the GATT system recognized early on that rules governing production and process would be difficult, if not impossible, to negotiate. So, the existing GATT rules are relatively silent about processes and leave the trade disciplines largely to final-product problems. Equally, however, environmental measures should be subjected to a “trade impact statement.” Politicians ought to know the benefits and costs of either trade or environmental measures.
