The Applications And Disadvantages Of SPS Agreement

With the development of trade globalization and the international exchange ofplant and animal products, the problems of the safety of food, plant and animal and theenvironment has been drawn attention to worldwide. Sanitary and phytosanitarystandards (SPS) aim to measure the safety of plant, animal and the environment. SPSAgreement is to regulate the measures of sanitary and phytosanitary standards under theframe of WTO and prevent unjustifiable discrimination and disguised restriction ontrade. The purpose of SPS Agreement is to establish a reasonable and multilateralframework, guide the inspection and quarantine of animal and plant and minimize thenegative impact on trade.In2013, the report number of WTO/SPS is1276; the report number of China’sforeign SPS is90. In the first quarter of2014, the report number of WTO/SPS is442;the report number of China’s foreign SPS is15. The report number and SPS havesignificant influence on China’s export. It is very urgent to study SPS Agreement.The first part of the thesis introduces the reason and significance of selecting thetopic, a literature review about SPS Agreement and respective methodology.The second part of this thesis describes the background and main content of SPSAgreement. Under the background of Uruguay Round, it introduces the cause and effectof forming SPS Agreement, explores the basic reason of establishing SPS Agreement,introduces its purpose and main content and analyzes some important principlesincluding transparency, scientific basis and risk analysis.The third part of this thesis summarizes the disadvantages by analyzing theproblems in the application of SPS Agreement taking the cases which have internationalinfluence as examples.The fourth part of the thesis discusses the enlightenment of the implementation ofSPS Agreement on China by analyzing the impacts of SPS Agreement on China’sagricultural trade and the importance of SPS Agreement to foreign trade.The fifth part of the thesis makes conclusions that SPS Agreement is veryimportant, still immature in china and has a vast development potential. much attentionshould be drawn on the study of SPS Agreement.