ABSTRACT
This chapter examines why patterns of international trade and efforts towards sustainable development appear to be on a collision course, and discusses the role and progress of existing institutional frameworks, including the Commission on Sustainable Development and the World Trade Organization (WTO), in attempting to reconcile them. It shows that one of the most effective measures which the UN Special Session could adopt would be to promote the establishment of an intergovernmental panel on trade and sustainable development. Such a panel would provide the WTO Environment Committee and other institutions with the factual and analytic foundation for the urgent reforms that are necessary to integrate the policy objectives of trade, environmental protection and sustainable development. The effects on the environment and sustainable development of the agreements on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, Technical Barriers to Trade, Subsidies and Countervailing Measures and the Dispute Settlement Understanding are of particular concern.
