Trade is not considered to be an end in itself under the SDG framework but rather a means of implementation (‘MoI’). Examples of trade-related targets in the SDGs are:

 

• SDG 2 on hunger and food security includes a call to correct and prevent trade restrictions and distortions in world agricultural markets, including through the parallel elimination of all forms of agricultural export subsidies and all export measures with equivalent effect.[1]

• SDG 3 on ensuring healthy lives and promoting wellbeing includes the target of providing “access to affordable essential medicines and vaccines”. It recalls the 2001 Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health, which affirms the right to use to the full the provisions in the TRIPS Agreement regarding flexibilities to protect public health, and provide access to medicines for all.[2]

• SDG 7 on sustainable energy calls for substantially increasing the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix. This is likely to require ongoing support from governments. However, clean energy subsidies have repeatedly been challenged under the WTO dispute settlement system.[3]

• SDG 8 on economic growth and employment: calls on improving Aid for Trade support for developing countries, especially for LDCs, including through the Enhanced Integrated Framework for trade-related technical assistance (EIF).[4]

• Goal 9 on industry, innovation and infrastructure notes the need for quality, reliable, sustainable and resilient infrastructure, including regional and trans-border infrastructure and increasing the integration of small-scale industrial and other enterprises, in developing countries, into value chains and markets.

• Goal 10 on reducing inequality stresses the importance of special and differential treatment for developing countries, in accordance with WTO agreements.[5]

• Goal 14 on conserving maritime resources: The ocean absorbs more than a quarter of CO2 emissions and therefore plays a key role in climate regulation. It is also a key source of food, medicine, minerals and renewable energy. SDG 14 further calls for disciplining (rich countries’) fishery subsidies, which is a key negotiating topic at the WTO. Also, maritime transport is essential to trade as over 90 per cent of the world’s trade is carried by sea. Shipping is, by far, the most cost-effective way to move goods and raw materials around the world. However, its also causes pollution of air and water, and is a growing source of GHG emissions.

• Goal 15 (sustain life on land; target 15.c): Enhance global support for efforts to combat poaching and trafficking (illegal trade) of protected species, including by increasing the capacity of local communities to pursue sustainable livelihood opportunities

• Goal 17 (strengthening the means of implementation and the global partnership for sustainable development) includes language on the importance of:

  • a universal, rules-based, open, non-discriminatory and equitable multilateral trading system under the WTO[6]

  • significantly increasing developing countries’ exports, including doubling the share of LDCs by 2020[7]

  • timely implementation of Duty-Free and Quota-Free market access on a lasting basis for all LDCs and ensuring that preferential rules of origin are transparent, simple and contribute to facilitating market access[8]

 

A cost-benefit analysis of the SDGs conducted by the Copenhagen Consensus Centre reveals that trade-related goals are “phenomenal” in terms of return on investment compared to other means of implementation such as official development aid (ODA).[9]

 

[1] Target 2.b: correct and prevent trade restrictions and distortions in world agricultural markets including by the parallel elimination of all forms of agricultural export subsidies and all export measures with equivalent effect, in accordance with the mandate of the Doha Development Round.

[2] Target 3.b: Support the research and development of vaccines and medicines for the communicable and non-communicable diseases that primarily affect developing countries, provide access to affordable essential medicines and vaccines, in accordance with the Doha Declaration on the TRIPS Agreement and Public Health, which affirms the right of developing countries to use to the full the provisions in the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights regarding flexibilities to protect public health, and, in particular, provide access to medicines for all.

[3] Some of the legal uncertainty around these subsidies could be removed by clarifying key concepts in the SCM Agreement in the context of clean energy subsidies as well as clarifying the applicability of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) Article XX General Exceptions provisions to the SCM Agreement; agreeing on a time-limited and conditional “peace clause” preventing WTO disputes being taken against certain carefully selected categories of climate-related subsidies; and re-introduction of the category of “non-actionable subsidies” under Article 8 of the SCM Agreement to provide leeway to certain types of clean energy subsidies. (Das and Bandyopadhyay, 2016)

[4] Target 8.a: increase Aid for Trade support for developing countries, particularly LDCs, including through the Enhanced Integrated Framework for LDCs.

[5] Target 10.a: Implement the principle of special and differential treatment for developing countries, least developed countries, in accordance with World Trade Organization agreements

[6] Target 17.10: promote a universal, rules-based, open, non-discriminatory and equitable multilateral trading system under the WTO including through the conclusion of negotiations within its Doha Development Agenda.

[7] Target 17.11: Significantly increase the exports of developing countries, with a view to doubling the least developed countries’ share of global exports by 2020

[8] Realize timely implementation of duty-free and quota-free market access on a lasting basis for all least developed countries, consistent with World Trade Organization decisions, including by ensuring that preferential rules of origin applicable to imports from least developed countries are transparent and simple, and contribute to facilitating market access

[9]www.copenhagenconsensus.com/publication/preliminary-benefit-cost-assessment-final-owg-targets