Simon Lester

Following-up on my post from yesterday, here's a survey of U.S. consumers' attitudes about country of origin labelling (COOL): /content/files/s/CFA-COOL-poll-press-release-May-2013.pdf As with most surveys related to trade, I find the approach very frustrating.  It ignores key points and doesn't really

Boston College law prof Frank Garcia has a new book called "Global Justice and International Economic Law." There's a lot going on in the book, and I can't do a full review here, but I wanted to mention one point he makes: Trade agreements

This is from a Washington Post article about USDA's revision to its country of origin labeling (COOL) measures, in response to a WTO ruling that the measures violate WTO obligations: But the regulations, posted Friday by the Department of Agriculture, are the latest move in a trade dispute

From the ASIL-IEcLIG: The American Society of International Law’s International Economic Law Interest Group (ASIL IEcLIG) is pleased to issue a Call for Proposals for its inaugural Junior Scholars Research Forum, to be held at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, in Philadelphia, on November 22, 2013. This

The latest WTO complaint, on various EU measures related to the biodiesel industry, is now available here: http://www.worldtradelaw.net/cr/ds459-1(cr).pdf  There are some complicated measures involved, and I don't claim to fully understand it all yet.  Here are some excerpts: The measures referred

Following up on the post from the other day, let's see what the EU member states think of an investment agreement with China: The European Commission decided today to ask the Member States for their agreement on a mandate to open negotiations on an investment agreement with China.

Well, sort of: The WTO’s Appellate Body ruled that the program’s requirement that meat producers gather a greater amount of information about meat origins than is ultimately conveyed to consumers downstream violated WTO requirements. To address this concern, USDA’s new rule will offer consumers more precise labels

The issue of trade in lethal injection drugs came up a while ago in relation to U.S. excecutions.  But we are not the only executioner around, and similar issues have now arisen in Viet Nam: Vietnam has issued a new law allowing domestically produced chemicals to be used in

I've always thought that the importance of production and process methods for the analysis of WTO rules is greatly overstated, but I recognize that others find it relevant, or at least interesting.  Hence, I feel obligated to point to the following statement by the AB in para. 5.

From Reuters: Some EU member states are also concerned that a procedure included in the mandate to allow for resolving disputes between investors and states. While such dispute mechanisms are increasingly common in free trade agreements, some EU diplomats say they are not necessary for two parties with strong legal