Chairman Kerry, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify before you concerning the environmental ramifications of the Final Agreement (the Final Agreement or the Agreement)1 of the Uruguay Round of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (the GATT).2 My name is Robert Housman. I am a Staff Attorney with the Center for International Environmental Law, and an Adjunct Professor of Law at the American University’s Washington College of Law. I appear today on behalf of the Sierra Club and the Defenders of Wildlife (Defenders).
Before moving to our analysis of the Final Agreement, I believe it is necessary to put the issue this hearing seeks to address in context. The issue here is not whether free trade is good or bad. We support the general principles of free and fair trade. Nor is the issue even whether free trade is good or bad for the environment. Indeed, under the right conditions, expanded trade and economic growth-can be environmentally beneficial. The issue I will address today is whether or not this particular agreement-the Final Agreement of the Uruguay Round-is good for the environment. This question is vital because environmental degradation has real economic costs-both to public health and to natural resources-that can undermine the very benefits that expanded trade is intended to bring. Environmental degradation also has real costs in human terms-cancer, lung disease, hepatitis, food poisoning. These human costs lower our standards of living-precisely the opposite effect that economic growth through expanded trade is intended to have.
Within this context, the goal of my testimony today is to provide you “just the facts” while avoiding the rhetoric and hyperbole that has plagued past discussions over the environmental impacts of trade agreements.