The Precautionary Principle and the WTO SPS Agreement
Subject Areas : environmental lowabbasali kadkhodaee 1 , Asma Salari 2
1 - Professor, Department of Public Law, Faculty of Law and Political Science, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.
2 - Ph.D. in International Law, Faculty of Law and Political Sciences, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran. *(Correspomding Author)
Keywords: The World Trade Organization, ThePrecautionary Principle, The Sanitary and Phytosanitary Agreement, Scientific Uncertainty,
Abstract :
Public health and environmental issues are really important and deserve to attract proportionate attention from the world trade organization whereas risks on them (both certain and uncertain) may cause to irreble and irreversible effects on people and the environment. Despite the world trade organization resistance to any kind of Protective measures, member states have frequently based their sanitary and phytosanitary measures on the precautionary Principle, an enivironmental principle of international law and have invoked it several times in their disputes before Dispute Settlement Body of the organization. These Attempts have led the panels and appellate bodies to declare that Article 5.7 of sanitary and phytosanitary agreement as a reflection of the precautionary principle in the world trade organization system. Considering the importance of abovementioned Article of the SPS, this paper will try to clarify theoretical and practical aspects of it . it was done on the descriptive-analytical methodology with the help of the available library source and recognized Article 5.7 as a reflection of the PP in the SPS agreement and it is applicable in DSB especially after issuing the appellate body report in the Continued Suspension Case.
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