TO panels do, and the signatories to the WTO have agreed to abide by the findings. So far, every country found to be in violation of WTO rules has voluntarily accepted the findings and taken steps to correct its practices. (When a country first rejects a WTO panel's findings, the organization will face probably its most difficult challenge: enforcing a finding.) Once a special panel makes a decision about a specific dispute, a country found to be in violation of WTO rules has several options, including repaying the aggrieved country for its losses or changing its policies to comply with the panel's findings. In the event that a nation in violation elects not to abide by its rulings, the WTO allows the complaining party as a last resort to retaliate through the use of counter trade sanctions. T he most far-reaching new power of the WTO is its jurisdiction over national policies that affect trade. This has already allowed the organization to grapple with a wide variety of issues. Including the use of growth hormones in U.S. beef production; U.S. chicken production methods; India's process-based patent laws that allow its domestic pharmaceutical industry to re-engineer drugs developed in other countries; EU claims that more of its cheese should be allowed to enter U.S. markets; the way Mexico catches tuna; and Thai, Malaysian, and Indian shrimp harvesting techniques that kill sea turtles. To this list are added intellectual property claims by France over the use of its regional wine labels and Switzerland's assertion that only it can use the Swiss Army Knife appellation. As more nations learn about WTO procedures, such examples will multiply. Although these trade policy reviews have just begun, they offer opportunities to introduce uniform global stipulations into domestic policies, with predictable outcries and controversies. The consequent reports that will emerge are one of the WTO's levers for introducing standards for internal policie...
