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1. Capacity Building:

Enhancing institutional and human capacities for integrated decision making.

2. Manuals and Policy Tools:

Incorporating the environment into economics and trade policies.

3. Partnerships and Consensus Building:

ETB works intensively with various organisations to develop synergies and build partnerships.

4. Enchancing Awareness:

Clarifying the relationships between trade, environment and development in order to design mutually supportive policies.


5. International Cooperation:
Enhancing cooperation between UNEP, governments and relevant intergovernmental and non-governmental organisations.

Publications Archive

UNEP's preparations for the Fourth WTO Ministerial Conference
Doha, Qatar - 9th - 13th November, 2001

Introduction | Synthesis Papers | Meeting Summaries | CBTF

Synthesis Papers

This page contains two new UNEP papers, released on 5 November 2001, as part of UNEP's preparations for the Fourth WTO Ministerial Conference, that will open in Doha, Qatar on 9th November.

The two papers are entitled "Economic Reforms, Trade Liberalization and the Environment: a Synthesis of UNEP Country Projects" and "Enhancing Synergies and Mutual Supportiveness of Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) and the WTO".

These two documents summarise key elements of the work undertaken over the last two years by UNEP's Economics and Trade Branch on concrete linkages between trade, environment and development.

"Economic Reforms, Trade Liberalization and the Environment: a Synthesis of UNEP Country Projects"

This paper summarizes the results of six country projects involving assessment of the environmental effects of trade liberalization and other trade-related policies at the national level. The projects examined the environmental, and related economic and social effects of these policies in the fisheries, agricultural and forestry sectors. The projects related to marine fisheries in Argentina and Senegal, banana production in Ecuador, cotton production in China, cocoa and rubber production in Nigeria, and forestry in Tanzania. The projects provide empirical analysis on the relationship between trade, environment and development policies and objectives, and have also helped to refine methodologies for the assessment of those linkages. These six projects build on the results of a first round of similar projects completed in 1999, and will be followed up with capacity-building and policy design and implementation activities in interested countries.

Download (141kb .pdf file)

"Enhancing Synergies and Mutual Supportiveness of Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) and the WTO"

The second paper summarizes and synthesizes the results of a series of five meetings that UNEP has organized since June 1999 on the relationship between MEAs and the WTO. These meetings have focused on unrealised opportunities to make MEAs and the WTO Agreements work more effectively together in pursuit of sustainable development. These meetings and the associated analysis have taken into account the technical assistance and capacity building needs of developing countries on this policy interface. A list of concrete next steps for enhancing synergies between MEAs and the WTO have been drawn from the results of these meetings. The version downloaded was updated on January 2002, to take into account developments in Doha and the preparatory process for the World Summit on Sustainable Development to be held in Johannesburg, Africa, in August-September 2002.

Download (106kb .pdf file)



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