e their competitiveness.Taiwan has set an example helping to emphasize the fact that there are certain limits which the earth has and can withstand while still holding our rapidly increasing human population. Overall, the biosphere is incapable of sustaining all six billion human inhabitants on the earth at the consumption of the industrialized countries (also known as the North), and the free trade agreements tend to overlook this important aspect. As Edward Goldsmith wrote in his essay Global Trade and the Environment on page 91 of The Case Against the Global Economy:Clearly, there is no way of protecting our environment within the context of a global free trade economy committed itself to continued economic growth and hence to increasing the harmful impact of our activities on an already fragile environment.The second argument in favor of free trade incorporates the freeing of individual entrepreneurs from an intrusive government (Audley, 21). This involves the freedom from governmental restrictions and other prohibiting laws which may limit ways that people use their resources to make money. Yet, having no restrictions also ruins the ecosystem by allowing wide spread destruction to occur due to favoring money and the improvement of life for lesser developed nations over the well being of the earth.In October of 1998, the World Trade Organization handed down a verdict against a U.S. law banning the importation of shrimp. This law was formed in order to prevent the killing of endangered sea turtles which become entrapped in nets used to catch shrimp. The law required that U.S. shrimpers use a TED (turtle excluder device). The controversy with this law occurred when the U.S. stated that they would not import shrimp from countries not using this device. The WTO claims that the U.S. was biased in their implementation of this policy. Some argue that this case is proof to many, that free trade threatens the environment. A World Wi...
