A Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) is being
negotiated, and aims to form a trading bloc stretching from
Alaska to Tierra del Fuego by the year 2005 as part of a
larger integration agenda. Parallel to this undertaking, environment
ministers of the Americas met for the first time at Montreal
in 2001 to discuss hemispheric cooperation on ecological
issues. Countries of the Americas are parties to sub-regional
environmental cooperation arrangements, members of the
UNEP Forum of LAC Environment Ministers and parties
to Multilateral Environmental Accords (MEAs) which use
trade measures, successfully, to support environmental goals.
How can new trade policies support environmental protection
in the Americas? Can the integration process lead to a
new, strengthened ecological cooperation agenda? If so,
what are the key problems that require solutions, which
instruments already exist and what are the prospects for a
new regime, or even a network of regimes?
Ecological Rules and Sustainability in the Americas is the second
in a series meant to strengthen hemispheric information,
capacity and analysis on trade and sustainability issues.
The study examines existing and potential trade, environmental
and social regimes in the Americas. This research
summary, by applying IISD's Winnipeg Principles on trade
and sustainable development to a network of over 272 relevant
global, hemispheric, sub-regional and bilateral environmental
instruments, provides recommendations for new
ecological cooperation agendas in the Americas.
