IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/ieaple/v17y2017i3d10.1007_s10784-017-9360-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Energy transitions and trade law: lessons from the reform of fisheries subsidies

Author

Listed:
  • Margaret A. Young

    (University of Melbourne)

Abstract

Fossil fuel subsidies, like subsidies to the fishing sector, lead to trade-distorting and ecologically harmful practices. The US$35 billion in subsidies provided by countries every year to the fishing sector leads to more and more boats being built, even as 90% of fish stocks are either fully exploited or overfished. An estimated US$444 billion in subsidies are provided annually for the production of fossil fuels by G20 countries, even as evidence emerges that oil, gas and coal reserves must remain unexploited to limit global warming increases to 2 °C. Of course, each country has its own development priorities, livelihood concerns and need for food and energy security. Agreeing upon subsidy reform is a complex undertaking that requires the assessment of social, political and historical considerations, as well as the involvement of international and transnational legal regimes that govern climate change, energy, fisheries and trade. This article reviews proposals for reform within the World Trade Organization and regional trade agreements, including the new disciplines on fisheries subsidies that were endorsed in the text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Although the latter agreement is unlikely to enter into force, consensus is emerging on the need to prohibit subsidies that contribute to overfishing or that are linked to illegal, unreported or unregulated fishing. The article shows how these legal developments might inform attempts to limit fossil fuel production and consumption subsidies. It highlights the need for learning and open deliberation about subsidy reform by affected stakeholders, including representatives from international organizations and civil society. It also points to new arrangements that link compliance with subsidy rules to standards and benchmarks from fisheries regimes, and demonstrates how such inter-regime connections are legitimate in the context of the fragmentation of international law. While reform to fisheries subsidies is still preliminary and fraught, there are useful lessons for the equally important project of energy transitions.

Suggested Citation

  • Margaret A. Young, 2017. "Energy transitions and trade law: lessons from the reform of fisheries subsidies," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 371-390, June.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:ieaple:v:17:y:2017:i:3:d:10.1007_s10784-017-9360-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s10784-017-9360-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10784-017-9360-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10784-017-9360-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Harro van Asselt & Kati Kulovesi, 2017. "Seizing the opportunity: tackling fossil fuel subsidies under the UNFCCC," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 357-370, June.
    2. Young, Margaret A., 2009. "Fragmentation or interaction: the WTO, fisheries subsidies, and international law," World Trade Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 8(4), pages 477-515, October.
    3. Mr. David Coady & Ian W.H. Parry & Louis Sears & Baoping Shang, 2015. "How Large Are Global Energy Subsidies?," IMF Working Papers 2015/105, International Monetary Fund.
    4. Roger Martini, 2012. "Fuel Tax Concessions in the Fisheries Sector," OECD Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Papers 56, OECD Publishing.
    5. Witbooi, Emma, 2008. "The infusion of sustainability into bilateral fisheries agreements with developing countries: The European Union example," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 32(4), pages 669-679, July.
    6. United Nations UN, 2015. "Transforming our World: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development," Working Papers id:7559, eSocialSciences.
    7. Timothy Meyer, 2017. "Explaining energy disputes at the World Trade Organization," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 391-410, June.
    8. U. Sumaila & Ahmed Khan & Andrew Dyck & Reg Watson & Gordon Munro & Peter Tydemers & Daniel Pauly, 2010. "A bottom-up re-estimation of global fisheries subsidies," Journal of Bioeconomics, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 201-225, October.
    9. Pramod, Ganapathiraju & Nakamura, Katrina & Pitcher, Tony J. & Delagran, Leslie, 2014. "Estimates of illegal and unreported fish in seafood imports to the USA," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 102-113.
    10. Michael Trebilcock & Kristen Pue, 2015. "The Puzzle of Agricultural Exceptionalism in International Trade Policy," Journal of International Economic Law, Oxford University Press, vol. 18(2), pages 233-260.
    11. Dirk Bièvre & Ilaria Espa & Arlo Poletti, 2017. "No iceberg in sight: on the absence of WTO disputes challenging fossil fuel subsidies," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 411-425, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Michelle Scobie, 0. "International aid, trade and investment and access and allocation," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-16.
    2. Thijs Van de Graaf & Harro van Asselt, 2017. "Introduction to the special issue: energy subsidies at the intersection of climate, energy, and trade governance," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 313-326, June.
    3. Harro van Asselt & Kati Kulovesi, 2017. "Seizing the opportunity: tackling fossil fuel subsidies under the UNFCCC," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 357-370, June.
    4. Jeremiás Máté Balogh & Tamás Mizik, 2021. "Trade–Climate Nexus: A Systematic Review of the Literature," Economies, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-19, June.
    5. Balogh, Jeremiás Máté, 2021. "A kereskedelmi megállapodások szerepe a klímaváltozásban. Szakirodalmi áttekintés [The role of trade agreements in climate change. Systematic literature review]," Közgazdasági Szemle (Economic Review - monthly of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences), Közgazdasági Szemle Alapítvány (Economic Review Foundation), vol. 0(5), pages 540-563.
    6. Michelle Scobie, 2020. "International aid, trade and investment and access and allocation," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 239-254, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Thijs Van de Graaf & Harro van Asselt, 2017. "Introduction to the special issue: energy subsidies at the intersection of climate, energy, and trade governance," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 313-326, June.
    2. Nicky R. M. Pouw & Hans-Peter Weikard & Richard B. Howarth, 2022. "Economic analysis of international environmental agreements: lessons learnt 2000–2020," International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 22(2), pages 279-294, June.
    3. Child, Michael & Koskinen, Otto & Linnanen, Lassi & Breyer, Christian, 2018. "Sustainability guardrails for energy scenarios of the global energy transition," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 321-334.
    4. Basak Bayramoglu & Brian Copeland & Jean-François Jacques, 2018. "Trade and fisheries subsidies [Le commerce international et les subventions à la pêche]," Post-Print hal-02624649, HAL.
    5. Christopher M. Dent, 2021. "Trade, Climate and Energy: A New Study on Climate Action through Free Trade Agreements," Energies, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-30, July.
    6. He, Juan, 2015. "Chinese public policy on fisheries subsidies: Reconciling trade, environmental and food security stakes," Marine Policy, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 106-116.
    7. Bayramoglu, Basak & Copeland, Brian R. & Jacques, Jean-Francois, 2018. "Trade and fisheries subsidies," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 13-32.
    8. Edward Oteng Asante & Genevieve Kuntu Blankson & Gabriela Sabau, 2021. "Building Back Sustainably: COVID-19 Impact and Adaptation in Newfoundland and Labrador Fisheries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-14, February.
    9. Dirk De Bièvre & Emile van Ommeren, 2021. "Multilateralism, Bilateralism and Institutional Choice: The Political Economy of Regime Complexes in International Trade Policy," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 12(S4), pages 14-24, May.
    10. Katharine Heyl & Felix Ekardt & Lennard Sund & Paula Roos, 2022. "Potentials and Limitations of Subsidies in Sustainability Governance: The Example of Agriculture," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(23), pages 1-26, November.
    11. Paulina Schiappacasse & Bernhard Müller & Le Thuy Linh, 2019. "Towards Responsible Aggregate Mining in Vietnam," Resources, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-15, August.
    12. Pina Puntillo, 2023. "Circular economy business models: Towards achieving sustainable development goals in the waste management sector—Empirical evidence and theoretical implications," Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 30(2), pages 941-954, March.
    13. Schlör, Holger & Venghaus, Sandra & Hake, Jürgen-Friedrich, 2018. "The FEW-Nexus city index – Measuring urban resilience," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 210(C), pages 382-392.
    14. Jean-Louis Combes & Alexandru Minea & Pegdéwendé Nestor Sawadogo, 2019. "Assessing the effects of combating illicit financial flows on domestic tax revenue mobilization in developing countries," CERDI Working papers halshs-02019073, HAL.
    15. Rohan Best & Paul J. Burke, 2020. "Energy mix persistence and the effect of carbon pricing," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 64(3), pages 555-574, July.
    16. Nelson, Ewan & Warren, Peter, 2020. "UK transport decoupling: On track for clean growth in transport?," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 90(C), pages 39-51.
    17. Ibrahim Ari & Muammer Koc, 2018. "Sustainable Financing for Sustainable Development: Understanding the Interrelations between Public Investment and Sovereign Debt," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(11), pages 1-25, October.
    18. R. Ebrahimi & S. Choobchian & H. Farhadian & I. Goli & E. Farmandeh & H. Azadi, 2022. "Investigating the effect of vocational education and training on rural women’s empowerment," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 9(1), pages 1-11, December.
    19. Benjamin Nölting & Bettina König & Anne B. Zimmermann & Antonietta Di Giulio & Martina Schäfer & Flurina Schneider, 2022. "Dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic: an opportunity to reflect on sustainability research," Sustainability Nexus Forum, Springer, vol. 30(1), pages 11-27, December.
    20. Rashmi Jaipal, 2017. "Psychology at the Crossroads," Psychology and Developing Societies, , vol. 29(2), pages 125-159, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:ieaple:v:17:y:2017:i:3:d:10.1007_s10784-017-9360-2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.