Lamy seeks focus on green issues in WTO

At a time when India is faced with a "false" NGO campaign on child labour and human rights violation by its industry, World Trade Organisation (WTO) chief Pascal Lamy said environment is linked with the multilateral trading system which must play a "bigger role" as required in the Doha Round.
"There is no doubt in my mind that for the WTO to accomplish bigger things on the environment, it must first complete the first ever environmental negotiating agenda that has been placed before it," Mr Lamy said in his address at the Yale University in the US.

Mr Lamy reminded the global trade negotiators that the Doha Round was the first ever round of negotiations to include an ‘environmental or green chapter'. It was also the "first ever round of negotiations to encourage members to conduct environmental reviews at the national level," he said.

India and many other developing countries have maintained that issues like environment and labour standards should not be linked with the global trade since these norms could well be used as "non-trade barriers" by the developed countries, particularly the European Union where the ‘green movement' is quite strong.

At a time when India is faced with a "false" NGO cam- paign on child labour and human rights violation by its industry, World Trade Organisation (WTO) chief Pascal Lamy said environ- ment is linked with the multilateral trading system which must play a "bigger role" as required in the Doha Round. "There is no doubt in my mind that for the WTO to accomplish bigger things on the environment, it must first complete the first ever environmental negotiating agenda that has been placed before it," Mr Lamy said in his address at the Yale Uni- versity in the US. Mr Lamy reminded the global trade negotiators that the Doha Round was the first ever round of negotia- tions to include an ‘envi- ronmental or green chap- ter'. It was also the "first ever round of negotiations to encourage members to conduct environmental reviews at the national level," he said. India and many other developing countries have maintained that issues like environment and labour standards should not be linked with the global trade since these norms could well be used as "non-trade barriers" by the developed countries, particularly the European Union where the ‘green movement' is quite strong.

Source: DC. 29/10/07