Ladies
and Gentleman, Madame President, It
is a pleasure to be here today for the Committee on Trade
and Environment's Information Session on Multilateral
Environment Agreements. I believe this is the first time
a director-general has attended a CTE meeting and I hope
it will not be the last.
I
am particularly glad that Klaus Töpfer, the executive
director of UNEP, is here with us this morning, together
with representatives from several MEA secretariats.
When
ministers agreed in Marrakesh in 1994 that a Committee on
Trade and Environment should be established, they
recalled, among other things, the Rio Declaration, Agenda
21 and the Preamble to the Agreement establishing the WTO
itself. Thus, the WTO, UNEP and MEAs share common
objectives.
The
CTE has a broad and complex analytical work programme.
The Singapore Ministerial Conference noted that the
breadth and complexity of the issues showed that further
work was needed on all items of its agenda. I think that
these MEA information sessions, which have become a
regular feature of the CTE, have served to enhance
Members' understanding of the relationship between the
trade and environment agendas, particularly with respect
to MEAs, as well as MEAs' grasp of the multilateral
trading system. Building on these sessions will help us
to maximise synergies and reduce potential tensions.
In
the GATT, the word “environment” was seldom
heard in trade circles (except when they talked about
“the trading environment”). The phrase
“sustainable development” was in nobody's
vocabulary until it was coined by the Brundtland
Commission in 1987, yet it served as the basis for the
progress made at the UN Conference on Environment and
Development in Rio in 1992.
I
think the placing of trade and environment issues on the
WTO's agenda and the introduction of sustainable
development as one of the WTO's aims has helped to raise
awareness internationally and nationally of the need to
maximise synergies between trade and environment
policies. That awareness raising owes much to the work of
the CTE over the last five years.
There
has also been a change of mentality at the WTO.
Discussions have served to dispel important
misconceptions and prejudices that used to prevail. It is
now conventional wisdom that multilateral cooperative
solutions based on international cooperation and
consensus is the best and most effective way for
governments to tackle environmental concerns. In this
sense, the WTO and MEAs are representatives of efforts of
the international community to pursue shared goals, and
due respect must be given to both. Our special study on
trade and the environment, published a year ago, was
emblematic of the WTO's new approach.
Through
a mutual exchange of information on trade and environment
issues, and increasing awareness of the processes in MEAs
and vice versa, the information sessions have served as a
confidence-building mechanism. They have also played a
role in fostering increased co-ordination between trade
and environment officials at the national as well as
international levels.
I
have looked over the many background papers that have
been prepared by the MEA Secretariats and I must admit
that one acronym, M.I.K.E., did catch my attention. I
understand from the CITES Secretariat's paper that it
stands for the programme on “Monitoring of the
Illegal Killing of Elephants.” I am glad that my
name is associated with environmental conservation.
In
discussing the relationship between the WTO and MEAs, in
general, it is important to bear in mind that there are
inherent difficulties in adapting a
“one-size-fits-all” approach. For this reason,
understanding and identifying areas of complementarity
between specific MEAs and the WTO represents a way to
maximize synergies and to minimize areas of potential
tension. In this respect, I welcome the initiative taken
by UNEP and the MEA secretariats to broaden the debate to
explore the numerous available synergies. This practical
approach focusing on concrete examples can provide the
basis for a more pro-active engagement with the trade
community.
Throughout
the discussions, I think we must remain vigilant to the
threat of protectionism; this is in the interest of the
environmental community itself, because if environmental
measures are seen, or believed, to be hidden “green
protectionism”, it would set back your cause and
ours.
We
must also remain sensitive to the situation and needs of
developing countries. Forging a common approach to trade
and environment between all WTO Members is essential.
Progress on ensuring that trade and environment policies
are put in place in a manner that is mutually supportive
cannot be made without the consent and support of
developing countries.
WTO
work will be helped by progress elsewhere on the
multilateral environmental policy agenda. The UNEP
meeting yesterday and the MEA information sessions, such
as the one today, are important steps forward in this
respect. Enhanced co-ordination will greatly facilitate
the smooth evolution of the trade and environmental
regimes.
Thank
you.
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