Climate change represents more than just an environmental challenge--it is also a challenge to future economic development. Overlaps between climate change and trade policies are inevitable and are already evident. This publication provides a timely collection of short forward-thinking articles by leading experts on the relationship between trade and climate change policies. They closely examine the interplay between climate and trade policies and institutions and offer recommendations for promoting a mutually supportive relationship.

A volume summarizing the key lessons from one of the world's most important projects on climate change.

Abstract: This paper discusses the role that trade can potentially play in both negotiating and operating a post Kyoto/post 2012 global climate policy regime. As an addition to the bargaining set for a global climate negotiation, trade in principle widens the range of jointly beneficial potential outcomes and can in this sense be a potential facilitator of an agreed global climate regime. The reverse is also true, that in a linked climate-trade-finance global policy coordination structure that goes well beyond what was envisioned at Bretton Woods, climate now added to the global policy bargaining set also offers the prospect of potentially stronger trade disciplines (and even beyond WTO disciplines being negotiated). Trade policy can as well be an instrument for the implementation of a global climate regime, since trade provides a mechanism for achieving an internalization outcome for the global externality that climate change represents, and that provides a potentially more efficient outcome and also helps meet distributional objectives. In short, trade added to the emerging post 2012 climate regime can both expand the bargaining set for both (effectively linked) negotiations, and additionally provide an instrument for the implementation of an agreed outcome.

Rafael Leal-Arcas expertly examines the interface of climate change mitigation and international trade law with a view to addressing the question: How can we make best use of the international trading system experience to aim at a global climate change agreement? The insightful book contributes to developing the architecture for a post- 2012 global climate agreement and, in doing so, seeks and proposes new approaches to climate change mitigation by linking it to the international trade system. The author suggests the adoption of a bottom-up approach to climate change negotiations by using the evolution of multilateral trade agreements as a model for reaching a global climate treaty. He discusses the innovative approach of inserting climate goals within regional trade agreements, given their proliferation – especially bilateral – in the international trading system. He explains the trade implications of climate change mitigation policies by analyzing a couple of areas where the international regimes for trade and climate change mitigation may potentially clash. Climate Change and International Trade will strongly appeal to undergraduate and graduate students of international and European trade law, international and European environmental law as well as social science academics. NGOs, think tanks, practitioners, researchers, and international organizations will also find plenty of valuable information in this timely resource.

This book synthesises several studies on the potential global impacts of two fundamental international policy initiatives: (i) multilateral agreements on climate protection strategies and (ii) trade agreements towards global trade liberalisation. Although these initiatives are not directly linked, they interrelate in subtle, yet important ways. Based on theoretical analyses and numerical simulations, the book provides guidelines on efficient strategies for climate change mitigation, implementing the framework of the Kyoto Protocol and the provided flexibility instruments, hereby accounting for interrelationships with existing and possible trade agreements on various levels. The analyses incorporate important real-world features, such as imperfect market structures, trade liberalisation settings, risk or transaction costs, that may substantially influence the magnitude and even the sign of policy impacts.

Given the shortcomings of the Paris Agreement, Anja Zenker examines the potential of free trade benefits as an incentive mechanism for an effective and stable climate change cooperation of states. She addresses the question of how the specific policy design affects the success of the agreement, market and trade outcomes, as well as the compatibility with multilateral WTO obligations.

This report aims to improve understanding about the linkages between trade and climate change. It shows that trade intersects with climate change in a multitude of ways. For example, governments may introduce a variety of policies, such as regulatory measures and economic incentives, to address climate change. This complex web of measures may have an impact on international trade and the multilateral trading system.