Regulatory Consistency Requirements in International Trade
Alan O. Sykes. One of the most challenging tasks for international trade agreements is to distinguish protectionist regulation from legitimate regulatory policies. An important set of tools in this regard may be termed “regulatory consistency requirements.” These include the national treatment obligation of GATT, which requires that imported goods be treated no less favorably than “like” domestic goods by regulators. Further consistency requirements were introduced at the formation of the WTO. These newer consistency requirements allow challenges to domestic regulation based on disparate policies toward different products and industries (such as beef and pork, or salmon and baitfish). This paper explores…