ABSTRACT
The issue of the critical linkage of trade and the environment has become quite important as the Uruguay Round winds its way through ratification by parliaments and the US The labor groups are borrowing a leaf from the environmental side and are trying to introduce labor standard requirements on the part of the other countries as a precondition for market access. The lengthy sections of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade report that looked at critical linkages showed that agricultural liberalization would be more likely to foster environmental preservation than to hurt it. The first set of international linkages encompasses what would be described as domestically-orientated pollution problems or environmental problems. To take a straightforward example: Mexico may have the same utility function on environment and income as the United States, but may prefer to address clean water, since dysentery is a much greater concern in Mexico.
