A Nordic Research Agenda On Environment and Trade

This background paper, produced by the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) for a 2004 MISTRA workshop in Malmö, Sweden, proposes a research agenda for Nordic countries on the intersection of trade and environment. Based on a survey of 315 publications from 2002 to 2003, the document identifies significant research gaps, particularly regarding the Doha Development Agenda and southern perspectives, and suggests priority areas for future academic and policy research to support sustainable development.

• A literature survey of 315 items reveals that research on trade and environment is unevenly distributed, with the heaviest focus on institution building, which accounted for 32% of the research. This area primarily addressed "regional approaches to trade and environment (integrating environment into regional free trade agreements), and conflicts between trade rules and MEAs."
• Research specifically focused on negotiating options within the Doha mandate is surprisingly low at 6.9%. Within this small subset, the relationship between the WTO and Multilateral Environmental Agreements (MEAs) received only 0.8% of total research.
• Southern research is underrepresented and lacks robustness; while 29% of works were authored by southern researchers, this figure drops to 18% if research commissioned by the UNEP/UNCTAD Capacity Building Task Force and two major IISD projects are removed.
• There is a significant gap in research regarding the environmental implications of the Doha negotiations, specifically the need to define what an "environmentally friendly Agreement on Agriculture would look like" and the unexplored environmental impacts of Non-Agricultural Market Access negotiations.
• Bilateral investment treaties (BITs) have proliferated, with over 2,000 agreements existing, yet they receive little research attention due to the fact that "arbitral disputes usually being closed to public scrutiny."
• The document identifies a need for research into "distributed governance," which refers to the "assignment of specific roles to different organizations in a defined relationship," particularly between the WTO and other international or non-governmental organizations.
• The paper suggests a new paradigm for agricultural negotiations that moves beyond reducing import tariffs to encompass "traditional knowledge, PPMs, technology transfer, food security and environmental protection."
• The authors argue for a shift in research scope from "trade and environment" to the broader "trade and sustainable development," asserting that the former is a subset of the latter and that the broader approach is more relevant in the long run.
• Nordic countries face specific challenges in developing this research agenda, including a "limited research base" and the tension between publishing in Nordic languages for domestic policy debate and publishing in English to enter the international debate.

APA

Halle, M. (2004). A Nordic Research Agenda On Environment and Trade. International Institute for Sustainable Development. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/trade_nordic_research_agenda.pdf

Chicago

Halle, Mark. A Nordic Research Agenda On Environment and Trade. International Institute for Sustainable Development, 2004. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/trade_nordic_research_agenda.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Halle |first1=Mark |title=A Nordic Research Agenda On Environment and Trade |publisher=International Institute for Sustainable Development |date=August 2004 |url=https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/trade_nordic_research_agenda.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{halle2004nordic, author = {Halle, Mark}, title = {{A Nordic Research Agenda On Environment and Trade}}, institution = {International Institute for Sustainable Development}, year = {2004}, month = aug, url = {https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/trade_nordic_research_agenda.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }