Keywords
CPTPP, SPS-Plus, Food Safety, Science, Risk Analysis
Document Type
Article
Abstract
Trade in food and agricultural products accounts for a major part of global trade, and the trade continues to alert domestic consumers to the risks associated with modern food processing and production methods. The Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), now rebranded as the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), represents a new model of mega-regional trade pacts posed to set higher standards for promoting and streamlining trade liberalization. Because of concerns with national food safety regulations that could constitute forms of non-tariff barriers, the CPTPP, in contrast to the World Trade Organization (WTO), stipulates further rules on parties’ sanitary and phytosanitary measures (SPS), achieving a type of role model of SPS-plus. This article explores the legal implications and progressiveness of the SPS-plus design, particularly focusing on the requirements of scientific evidence and risk analysis. The SPS-plus that sets hurdles for national regulatory regimes largely reflects WTO jurisprudence, international health standards, and the national regulations of the United States. I argue that the role model may provide momentum to modernize parties’ food safety regimes, but the cost of full compliance could be high. Genuine collaboration, experience-sharing, and technological and financial support between developed countries and less developed countries may alleviate the difficulties of implementation and promote coherence.
Recommended Citation
Ni, K. (2020). Science and Risk Analysis in CPTPP/SPS-Plus: Role Model or Unbearable Burden?. Journal of Food Law & Policy, 15(2). Retrieved from https://scholarworks.uark.edu/jflp/vol15/iss2/6