Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/145110 
Year of Publication: 
2016
Series/Report no.: 
WTO Staff Working Paper No. ERSD-2016-13
Publisher: 
World Trade Organization (WTO), Geneva
Abstract: 
The last 25 years have witnessed a rapid increase in regional trade agreements (RTAs). Although RTAs generally aim at lowering tariff and non-tariff trade barriers, an increasing number of trade agreements extend their scope to cover specific policy areas such as environmental protection and sustainable development. This paper establishes a comprehensive typology and quantitative analysis of environment-related provisions included in RTAs. The analysis covers all the RTAs currently into force that have been notified to the WTO between 1957 and May 2016, namely 270 trade agreements. While environmental exceptions, along with environmental cooperation continue to be the most common types of environment-related provisions, many other different types of provisions are incorporated in an increasing number of RTAs. The common feature of all environment-related provisions, including environmental exceptions, is their heterogeneity in terms of structure, language and scope.
Subjects: 
Regional Trade Agreements
Environment
Sustainable Development
JEL: 
F13
F18
Persistent Identifier of the first edition: 
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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