期刊名称：OECD Food, Agriculture and Fisheries Working Papers
电子版ISSN：1815-6797
出版年度：2015
期号：86
DOI：10.1787/5jrw8fg0rr8x-en
出版社：Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)
摘要：While public regulation in food and agriculture is attracting attention at both policy andresearch level for their potential implications on international food trade, policy implicationsof agricultural standards – understood to be legally not mandatory and hence voluntary – aremuch less well understood. Yet, environmental and organic standards have grown inimportance in agriculture and agri-food chains, making also their potential trade effects morerelevant. In this context, understanding the linkages between governments and standards hasbecome a key element in the debate.This report analyses possible roles of public authorities in the area of environmental andorganic standards, including policy objectives, options for interaction and means for the useof standards for achieving public policy goals. It identifies the main objectives behindgovernment activity on environmental and organic standards in the area of consumerprotection and fraud prevention, the enabling of functioning food markets and theimprovement of efficiency in the design, implementation and monitoring of public policies.Countries have taken very different approaches towards dealing with standards on organicagriculture which frequently, though not always, are seen as a subset of environment-relatedstandards. Choices for organic standards range between market self-regulation and thedevelopment of government-owned public standards. More generally, the level of publicintervention often reflects OECD governments’ perception on the environmental benefits oforganic agriculture itself.
