The World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures (SPS Agreement) disciplines WTO Members’ health regulations to prevent their misuse for protectionist purposes. In doing so, its obligations reflect several elements of the rule of law, including legal certainty, non-arbitrariness and non-discrimination, as well as a recognition of the rights of individuals. Through its obligations of non-discrimination, transparency and scientific justification and the scope it leaves for Members to prioritise the protection of health over trade liberalisation, the SPS Agreement can be regarded as entailing a rule-of-law approach. However, cognisant of the limits to the rule of law when transposed to the international level, it is important to avoid an overly “judicialised” approach to the disciplines of the SPS Agreement, and in particular its reliance on scientific justification to prevent arbitrariness in sanitary and phytosanitary regulation. Otherwise, there is a risk of intruding too far into the regulatory autonomy of States, weakening the “compliance pull” of the agreement and thus inadvertently undermining the rule of law in this area. An approach that instead recognises the inherent subjectivity and uncertainty in science and respects Members’ divergent priorities in health regulation would go further in engendering support for the rules-based system of international trade.

中文翻译：

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通过世界贸易组织《实施卫生和植物检疫措施协定》来规范卫生法规：科学与法治

世界贸易组织 (WTO) 卫生与植物检疫措施协定（SPS 协定）对 WTO 成员的卫生法规进行规范，以防止其被滥用于保护主义目的。在此过程中，其义务反映了法治的几个要素，包括法律确定性、非任意性和非歧视性，以及对个人权利的承认。通过其非歧视、透明度和科学论证的义务，以及它为成员国留下的将健康保护置于贸易自由化之上的空间，《卫生和植物检疫措施协定》可以被视为一种法治方法。然而，认识到法治在转移到国际层面时的局限性，重要的是要避免对《卫生和植物检疫措施协定》的纪律采取过度“司法化”的做法，特别是其依赖科学依据来防止卫生方面的任意性。和植物检疫监管。否则，就有可能过度侵犯各国的监管自主权，削弱协议的“合规拉力”，从而无意中破坏该领域的法治。相反，认识到科学固有的主观性和不确定性并尊重成员国在卫生监管方面不同优先事项的方法将进一步为基于规则的国际贸易体系提供支持。