Standards are a feature of virtually all areas of trade in products and services. Yet, although standards may achieve an efficient economic exchange, they have discriminatory consequences for trading partners when governments formulate or apply them in such a way as to cause obstacles to trade, thus enrolling standards among the increasingly significant ‘non-tariff barriers’ regulated by the WTO. This unique and original study analyses the functions that standards fulfil in the market, their effect on trade, and the legal regime based on harmonization, equivalence and mutual recognition developed by the WTO to deal with standards. The author investigates the way in which both the WTO Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) and the Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Measures Agreements regulate these three tools, and discusses key topics including: The definition of the concept ‘International Standard’ in the TBT Agreement. Guidelines on equivalence issued by organizations such as the Codex Alimentarius Commission, the World Organization for Animal Health and the International Plant Protection Convention. Parallels between the EC mutual recognition regime and the WTO system. This is the first work on its subject. With its detailed and practical analysis of WTO law on standards, the book is a fundamental reference for practitioners, academics and policy makers in international trade law.

Starting from the premise that a multilateral legal framework is the surest way to achieve predictability and transparency under conditions of increasing reliance on internationally traded energy, the essays gathered in this book treat the many complex interlocking issues raised by examining that desideratum in the light of current reality. Concentrating on the application of WTO agreements to energy trade – as well as energy-related issues addressed in the current WTO negotiations – the authors offer in-depth discussion and analysis of such issues as the following: the effectiveness of existing WTO agreements in addressing issues pertinent to energy trade how restrictive practices of energy endowed countries can be tackled under existing international trade rules; existing frameworks for investment in highly capital-intensive energy infrastructure projects;and conditions for access to pipelines and transmission grids; regulation of energy services; bioenergy development and trade; energy issues addressed in the WTO accession negotiations of energy endowed countries; international instruments of resolution of energy-related disputes.