On The Precautionary Principle And Its Applicability In The WTO

As the Golden Rules of international environment law, the precautionaryprinciple aims to take measures to the risk in advance which lacks of surely scientificbasis but maybe do harm to human health and natural resources. At present, besidesthe field of international environment law, many international instruments havementioned the precautionary principle and EU also regards the precautionaryprinciple as a customary international law to widely use. However, different interestgroups have different attitudes towards the precautionary principle. It still hasdifficulty in forming an agreed concept of the precautionary principle. There is a bigdifference in stating the precautionary principle between the WTO laws and BiosafetyProtocol. So how to enhance the applicability of the precautionary principle under theWTO system and how to settle dispute between environment and trade have becomea heated issue among scholars.This dissertation tries to start with the articles of the precautionary principle inthe WTO and Biosafety Protocol, then analyze the applicability of the precautionaryprinciple with the help of typical cases mentioned in DSB and discuss the status ofthe precautionary principle in international law and the improvement of the system.This dissertation is divided into four parts: The first part is mainly about thesummary of the precautionary principle. In this part, at first, the dissertation willintroduce how the precautionary principle came about and developed; then introducethe concept and central elements of the precautionary principle. On this basis, thedissertation will discuss the applicable obstacles of the precautionary principle and tryto put forward my own views on the concept of the precautionary principle.Thesecond part will discuss the precautionary principle in WTO laws. Starting witharticles of the WTO laws, this dissertation will analyze how the precautionaryprinciple applies to the asbestos and hormones case in EU specifically and discusswhat attitude of the WTO has towards the precautionary principle.The third partshows the precautionary principle in Biosafety Protocol. This dissertation will analyze the specific rules of the precautionary principle in Biosafety Protocol and theissue caused by specific practice of DBS, that is to say, the relationship between theWTO and Biosafety Protocol. In this way, it will discuss how to settle trade disputesconcerning this principle under the WTO law frame.The fourth part shows the statusof the precautionary principle in international law and the improvement of system.This part mainly discusses the conflict over the status of the precautionary principlein international law and puts forward my own views on the status of the precautionaryprinciple in international law. On this basis, this article will raise some suggestionsabout how to improve the system of the precautionary principle.Through the above analysis, as far as the author am concerned, although theprecautionary principle still has many problems about specific applicability, with thereform and development of the WTO and the improvement of system, theprecautionary principle at last will be a customary international law and plays animportant part in the conflict between environmental protection and trade freedom.