Bilateral investment treaties pose many challenges to developing countries, and initiatives are underway to move towards a new framework. This message is contained in a closing speech by Mariama Williams on behalf of the South Centre at the 6th Annual Investment Forum for Developing Country Negotiators, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 29-31 October 2012, which was co- organised by the South Centre.
Hazards in Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs): Investors’ rights v. public health
By Carlos Correa
An arbitral tribunal is expected to issue soon a decision on jurisdictional matters in a case brought by Philip Morris against the government of Uruguay. The claim, based on a bilateral investment treaty (BIT) between that country and Switzerland, challenges packaging and labeling requirements for cigarettes adopted by Uruguay to reduce tobacco’s consumption. (more…)
The twists and turns of the Doha talks and the WTO
By Martin Khor
Welcome to this session on Doha and the Multilateral Trading System – From Impasse to development? which the South Centre is pleased to co-organise.
This session aims to look at what the future holds for the WTO, in particular in relation to the development dimension, and the interests of the developing countries.
After the Uruguay Round, the developing countries went into a mood of reflection because many of them were not active in the negotiations and did not fully understand what they had signed on to or the implications. So for a number of years after 1995, for the developing countries, their priority in the WTO was to understand the obligations they had entered into and the problems of implementation, particularly in new issues such as TRIPS, Services, TRIMS which they had been obliged to take on as new obligations, in exchange for the re-entering of agriculture and textiles into the GATT system. And to get the WTO to review and possibly reform its rules.
Towards an alternative narrative for the multilateral trading system
By Faizel Ismail
This presentation will argue that the recent attempts by some policy makers to use the concept of Global Value Chains (GVCs) to make a case for increased trade liberalization is deeply flawed for three reasons: First because it attempts to bring back the notion of a self-regulating market that is disembedded from society and divorced from the asymmetries in economic power that characterize today’s interdependent global economy; Second, because it attempts to revive the discredited Washington Consensus; and third because it does not provide a framework for helping developing economies develop beyond their current comparative advantages. Consequently, this approach to trade liberalization we will argue is a false basis to re-invigorate the current Doha round and to deal with the crisis in multilateralism. We will attempt to provide an alternative and more sustainable basis to rebuild the multilateral trading system.
Trade and Investment Agreements—Barriers to National Public Health and Tobacco Control Measures.
An arbitral tribunal is expected to issue soon a decision on jurisdictional matters in a case brought by Philip Morris against the government of Uruguay. The claim, based on a bilateral investment treaty (BIT) between that country and Switzerland, challenges packaging and labeling requirements for cigarettes adopted by Uruguay to reduce tobacco’s consumption. (more…)
What Explains the South’s Recent High Growth — And Can It Continue?
By Yilmaz Akyüz
Recently there emerged a view that developing countries had “de-coupled” their economies from the developed countries and had taken off to a path of high growth. But this is an overly-optimistic view. This article by the South Centre’s Chief Economist examines the growth record of developing countries and analyses how the good performance was based mainly on external factors that no longer exist. The next issue of SouthViews will have a follow-up article on the need for a new development strategy in the South.
IP rights under investment agreements: The TRIPs-plus implications for enforcement and protection of public interest.
The proliferation of investment and IP agreements raises fundamental questions on the relationship between such agreements and the implementation of national policies for economic development. (more…)
Intellectual Property in Investment Agreements: The TRIPS-plus Implications for Developing Countries.
This analytical note examines, in particular, the implication of the emerging approaches relating to the fair and equitable treatment and the national and mostfavoured nation (MFN) treatment in investment agreements for the overall regimes for the protection and enforcement of IP in developing countries. (more…)
Developments on Discussions for the Improvement of the Framework for ICSID Arbitration and the Participation of Developing Countries.
The International Centre for settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) is established by the Convention on the Settlement of Investment Disputes between States and Nationals of Other States (the ICSID Convention) that entered into force on October 14, 1966. (more…)
