從私營標準之發展論SPS協定在全球食品安全治理之功能與限制

Abstract

近年來，國內外發生一連串攸關食品安全之事件，並在國際貿易推波助瀾下，影響範圍更為深遠，引發各界對全球食品安全議題之關注。隨著消費者意識抬頭，消費者對產品安全的重視與日俱增，順勢興起各式各樣私營標準之蓬勃發展。雖然此等私營標準係由非政府部門之企業或團體所採行，不具備法律強制拘束之效力，但因日益普遍之結果導致市場排擠效應，使得部分中小型生產業者為能進入特定採行私營標準之市場，不得不積極使其產品取得各種私營標準的認證，進而產生影響國際間貿易障礙之疑慮。此議題對開發中國家之影響甚於已開發國家，SPS委員會自2005年起便針對私營標準對國際貿易之影響開始討論。我國農產品及食品貿易頻繁，對於私營標準之相關法律議題，有研究之必要與實益。本文旨在探討私營標準之興起與SPS協定之適用關係，除探討私營標準對國際自由貿易體系所帶來的影響外，嘗試分析SPS協定在全球食品安全治理之角色與功能限制，並探討SPS委員會對私營標準議題可能之處理方式。

There have been a series of domestic or international events negatively involved with food safety and public health concerns in recent years. With the liberalization of international trade, the impact has gained its serious magnitude to invoke public attention on global food safety governance. As the consumer welfare and benefits becoming the major consideration in shaping business policy, various kinds of private standards have been formulated and followed by many food retailers to satisfy consumers’ demand for a safer and healthier supply of food or agricultural products. Despite being voluntary (not legally mandatory) in nature, these private standards will in fact determine certain products’ access to the market. With the dominance of these private standards, small or medium size suppliers or producers had a hard time getting their products certified by institutions recog-nized by private standard setting bodies. Many WTO Members, especially developing country Members, have expressed their concern of private standards over possible trade-restrictive effect since 2005 in the SPS Committees, and continued to discuss this issue in several occasions. Given the agricultural and food trade constituted a major part of international trade, we should also look into this issue for our own benefits. This article aims at examining the impact of private standards on international trade system and the role of SPS Agreement in the era of private standard proliferation, including the applicability of SPS Agreement to regulate private standards. Moreover, the article tries to explore the function and limitation of SPS Agreement in dealing with the global food safety issues along with the possible reactions or options WTO Members or the SPS Committee may take to ease the trade concern over private standards.