A Framework for Assessing the Relationship between Trade Liberalization and Biodiversity Conservation

The report establishes a framework for analyzing how trade liberalization affects biodiversity through indirect economic effects, independent direct effects, and public policy changes. It identifies ten types of trade effects and tests the framework using case studies of Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, highlighting significant data gaps and the complexity of quantifying these linkages.

• Trade liberalization impacts biodiversity through three primary channels: indirect effects via economic activity (product, scale, and structural effects), independent direct effects resulting from global market conditions, and effects on public policy.
• Independent effects of trade on biodiversity are driven by the commoditization of local economies, the internationalization of investment capital, and the spatial separation of consumption from the environmental costs of production.
• Trade liberalization can lead to four specific threats to biodiversity: intensified natural resource extraction for export, the intensification of monoculture in food production, land-use pressures from trade-servicing infrastructure, and the introduction of invasive alien species.
• Trade agreements can create 'regulatory effects,' where governments delay or avoid implementing environmental laws to maintain industrial competitiveness in global markets.
• In Indonesia, trade liberalization and IMF-supported reforms contributed to the overexploitation of forests, specifically through the historical use of prohibitive export taxes on logs that lowered domestic prices and benefited plywood cartels.
• Indonesian shrimp aquaculture, driven by export demand, has caused significant biodiversity loss through the destruction of mangrove swamps, with 20% to 50% of such destruction attributed to shrimp aquaculture expansion in Asia.
• In Papua New Guinea, the forestry industry is identified as the greatest threat to biodiversity, with logging increasing 400% since 1992 as Malaysian companies shifted operations to PNG following export bans in Sabah and Sarawak.
• The application of the framework to case studies reveals two critical limitations: a scarcity of life-cycle analysis (LCA) data for products and the extreme complexity of quantifying the linkages between trade measures and biodiversity outcomes.

APA

Conway, T. (1998). A Framework for Assessing the Relationship between Trade Liberalization and Biodiversity Conservation. International Institute for Sustainable Development. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/tradelib_biodiv.pdf

Chicago

Conway, Tom. A Framework for Assessing the Relationship between Trade Liberalization and Biodiversity Conservation. International Institute for Sustainable Development, 1998. https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/tradelib_biodiv.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Conway |first1=Tom |title=A Framework for Assessing the Relationship between Trade Liberalization and Biodiversity Conservation |publisher=International Institute for Sustainable Development |date=December 1998 |url=https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/tradelib_biodiv.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{conway1998framework, author = {Conway, Tom}, title = {{A Framework for Assessing the Relationship between Trade Liberalization and Biodiversity Conservation}}, institution = {International Institute for Sustainable Development}, year = {1998}, month = dec, url = {https://www.iisd.org/system/files/publications/tradelib_biodiv.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }