TRADE FEATURES PROMINENTLY AT UNEP GOVERNING COUNCIL

At a recent meeting, the new UN Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director Achim Steiner and WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy -- echoed by a number of environment ministers and other high-level participants -- called for improving the synergies between the trade and environment regimes.

In addition to Lamy, several heads of UN agencies attended the 24th Session of the UNEP Governing Council/Global Ministerial Environment Forum (GC-24/GMEF), held from 5 to 9 February in Nairobi, Kenya. Through a series of panel discussions and interactive roundtables, participants discussed globalisation and the environment and UN reform. While participants continued to be divided on the need to establish a comprehensive new UN environment organisation, they generally agreed on the need for better coordination between trade and environment policy-making processes.

The UN General Assembly established the Governing Council in 1972 as a forum for the international community to address major and emerging environmental policy issues.

Lamy, Chirac champion environmental sustainability

Speaking at the GC plenary in Nairobi, WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy referred to sustainable development as central to the WTO and urged continued support from the environmental community in bringing the WTO Doha Round of negotiations to a successful conclusion. This would "tear down the barriers that stand in the way of trade in clean technologies and services" as well as reduce "the environmentally harmful agricultural subsidies that are leading to overproduction and harmful fisheries subsidies which are encouraging over-fishing and depleting the world's fish stock," he said.

Lamy emphasised that ongoing trade negotiations have a potential to facilitate a more efficient global allocation of resources. He stressed, however, that "for this efficient allocation to truly materialise, we all know that resources must be properly priced to start with - that externalities would have to be internalised. In today's world, our policies are not fully synchronised."

On the relations between trade liberalisation and environmental protection, Lamy noted that the WTO and UNEP are driven by their respective member states and that members should seek coherence, starting at the national level.

President Jacques Chirac of France, speaking at the Paris Conference for Global Ecological Governance just prior to the UNEP Governing Council, also called for full-cost pricing and clarity in trade rules.

He championed the idea of a new UN Environment Organisation (UNEO), sending a strong message to the UNEP Governing Council. According to Chirac, "our international policy-making structure is ill-suited to the crucial issue of the 21st century, namely the environment. A new industrial revolution lies ahead - the sustainable development revolution… It will mean cutting pollution; including environmental quality in calculating GDP; and pricing natural resources fairly." To achieve this, he stressed the need for clear and fair competition rules, "either the international community knuckles down, or there will be an environmental war."

Chirac has previously supported the idea of imposing so called border tax adjustments to imports from countries that do not sign up to a future international treaty on climate change (see Bridges Weekly, 22 November 2006, http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/06-11-22/story2.htm).

Ministerial roundtables provide food for thought on trade

Six ministerial roundtables that took place in a new, interactive format introduced at the 24th GC/GMEF examined opportunities and challenges arising in the context of globalisation and the role of UNEP and governments in that respect. Ministers suggested that UNEP contribute substantially to the global trade dialogue, including through strengthened collaboration with the WTO. They called upon governments to promote policy coherence between national environment, trade and sectoral (e.g. agriculture) ministries and to reduce or eliminate subsidies that distort prices of natural resources.

Delegates called upon UNEP to contribute to the dialogue on trade to help shape trade-related rules and institutions that affect the environment. Actions by UNEP would also include working with the WTO on the mutual supportiveness of trade and environment to ensure the benefits of environment on trade and trade on environment, respectively. Delegates suggested that the international community strengthen international environmental governance to respond to globalisation processes and to ensure greater parity among international organisations promoting sustainable development (e.g. multilateral environmental agreements and the WTO).

Trade-related institutions also featured in discussions on the reform of the UN. Delegates pointed out that a reformed UN institution for the environment -- a possible UNEO -- should have closer relations with the World Bank and the WTO. They noted that the increased recognition that environmental issues are interlinked not only with development and sustainable growth, but also with agriculture trade, health and security have increased the need for global environmental leadership.

Additional resources

Speech at the UNEP GC by Pascal Lamy http://www.wto.org/english/news_e/sppl_e/sppl54_e.htm

Paris conference "Call for Action" http://www.citoyensdelaterre.fr/conference/?PARIS-CALL-FOR-ACTION

For daily reporting and a summary of GC-24/GMEF, see IISD Reporting Services at http://www.iisd.ca/unepgc/24unepgc/

ICTSD reporting; "Environment Ministers Rise to the Challenge of Globalization and UN Reform," UNEP RELEASE, 9 February 2007; ENB Vol. 16 No. 60, 12 February 2007.