sustainable development 20 years on from the ... - José Eli da Veiga

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environment, and are thus more affected by any regulations to combat climate change. A number of
OECD countries are adopting climate-change measures that have trade impacts, such as border
adjustment measures, subsidies and technical standards or regulations.
With a view to creating a favourable global economic and trade framework for combating climate
change and ensuring global economic growth and welfare, it is necessary to avoid conflict between the
international-trade and climate-change agendas; and for that purpose it is essential to design climatechange
actions that are consistent with the rules of the multilateral trading system. Otherwise, disputes
over climate change will proliferate in the WTO, which will weaken the international cooperation needed
in climate-change policies.
The most immediate risk in initiatives affecting exports is the increasing tendency of the private
sector to demand products with a low environmental impact, which in some sectors is also an opportunity
to place clean products on markets. Life-cycle analysis of tradable products and services would require
life-cycle emissions of products and services to be included in their carbon footprint, for which there is
not yet an international standard or single methodology. For Latin America and the Caribbean, the
outcome is very important, because the region’s exports may gain or lose competitiveness in relation to
other regions, depending on the methodology used.
As consumers become more environmentally aware, and firms strive to become more energy
efficient and enhance their environmental profiles, private initiatives to measure the carbon footprint and
other parameters of environmental impact have proliferated. One study discovered over 330 eco-labels of
various levels of complexity, covering 40 industrial sectors in 211 countries (WRI/Big Room Inc., <strong>20</strong>10).
Examples of firms now requiring some form of eco-labelling in their products are Patagonia, Timberland,
Tesco, Wal-Mart and Casino (Brenton, Edwards-Jones and Friis, <strong>20</strong>09; Ball, <strong>20</strong>09).
The process of “reprimarization” of the region’s export basket has been ongoing since the late
1990s, largely owing to the rise in international commodity prices fuelled by burgeoning global demand
(see figure V.9), and is accentuating the risk of greater regulation of trade on environmental grounds,
because commodities and natural-resource-based manufactures largely coincide with products defined as
environmentally sensitive.
The best way to reduce the risk that industrialized countries will adopt unilateral measures is to
reach a sound multilateral agreement that distinguishes between <strong>development</strong> levels and links the
commitments of developing countries to the provision of financial assistance and technology transfer. The
key challenge is preparedness to meet the challenges of a new low-carbon global economy. Governments
in the region need to coordinate their position on these issues as soon as possible in the various forums
that discuss the nexus between trade and <strong>sustainable</strong> <strong>development</strong>; and they should take steps to apply the
principles promoted in international forums at the national and regional levels. Regional cooperation has
broad scope for progress on these issues; but if each country in the region addresses these issues in
isolation, collaboration synergies and economies of scale will be lost. It is essential to act regionally and
on a coordinated basis in this area, based on specific and adequately financed projects.
at the three-digit level) which incur the highest pollution reduction and control costs (over 1% of their total
sales), including the following: iron and steel; non-ferrous metals; industrial chemicals; wood pulp and paper,
and non-metallic minerals. In addition to being highly polluting, these industries make intensive use of capital,
energy and land (Murillo, <strong>20</strong>07, pp. 27-28; Low and Yeats, 1992).