The role of trade and the WTO in ensuring food security

Abstract

This article seeks to examine the role of trade and specifically that of the WTO (World Trade Organization) in ensuring, or otherwise, food security and fulfilling one of the Millennium Development Goals’ objectives of halving world hunger by 2015. It highlights the impact of the WTO agreement on trade-related intellectual property rights (TRIPs) on the domestic regulatory and legislative framework of WTO members. The article also draws attention to the implications that TRIPs may have for future food security and examines briefly the Indian sub-continent where the impact of the food security-related provisions of the agreement have been greatly contested. By following such an approach it may be possible to illuminate the dangers and pitfalls in TRIPs, but also instances where amendments to and flexibilities within TRIPs can be utilised by WTO member states in order to enhance their citizens’ food security.