Environmental Cooperation before and after NAFTA

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) expanded into issues which, until some years ago, were not normally part of formal trade negotiations. One of these was environmental protection. None of the three governments initially intended to include this issue in the negotiations. However, having been incorporated into the United States’ political agenda, it was eventually accepted by the other two countries. This reluctant acceptance, in addition to US needs of reconciling opposing domestic interests, clearly anticipated the strong limits of the environmental agreements eventually reached by the parties. 7 Environmental Cooperation before and after NAFTA