• Title/Summary/Keyword: developed countries

Search Result 3,700, Processing Time 0.029 seconds

Interpretation of the Umbrella Clause in Investment Treaties (국제투자조약상 포괄적 보호조항(Umbrella Clauses)의 해석에 관한 연구)

  • Jo, Hee-Moon
    • Journal of Arbitration Studies
    • /
    • v.19 no.2
    • /
    • pp.95-126
    • /
    • 2009
  • One of the controversial issues in investor-state investment arbitration is the interpretation of "umbrella clause" that is found in most BIT and FTAs. This treaty clause requires on Contracting State of treaty to observe all investment obligations entered into with foreign investors from the other Contracting State. This clause did not receive in-depth attention until SGS v. Pakistan and SGS v. Philippines cases produced starkly different conclusions on the relations about treaty-based jurisdiction and contract-based jurisdiction. More recent decisions by other arbitral tribunals continue to show different approaches in their interpretation of umbrella clauses. Following the SGS v. Philippines decision, some recent decisions understand that all contracts are covered by umbrella clause, for example, in Siemens A.G. v. Argentina, LG&E Energy Corp. v. Argentina, Sempra Energy Int'l v. Argentina and Enron Corp. V. Argentina. However, other recent decisions have found a different approach that only certain kinds of public contracts are covered by umbrella clauses, for example, in El Paso Energy Int'l Co. v. Argentina, Pan American Energy LLC v. Argentina and CMS Gas Transmission Co. v. Argentina. With relation to the exhaustion of domestic remedies, most of tribunals have the position that the contractual remedy should not affect the jurisdiction of BIT tribunal. Even some tribunals considered that there is no need to exhaust contract remedies before bringing BIT arbitration, provoking suspicion of the validity of sanctity of contract in front of treaty obligation. The decision of the Annulment Committee In CMS case in 2007 was an extraordinarily surprising one and poured oil on the debate. The Committee composed of the three respected international lawyers, Gilbert Guillaume and Nabil Elaraby, both from the ICJ, and professor James Crawford, the Rapportuer of the International Law Commission on the Draft Articles on the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts, observed that the arbitral tribunal made critical errors of law, however, noting that it has limited power to review and overturn the award. The position of the Committee was a direct attack on ICSID system showing as an internal recognition of ICSID itself that the current system of investor-state arbitration is problematic. States are coming to limit the scope of umbrella clauses. For example, the 2004 U.S. Model BIT detailed definition of the type of contracts for which breach of contract claims may be submitted to arbitration, to increase certainty and predictability. Latin American countries, in particular, Argentina, are feeling collectively victims of these pro-investor interpretations of the ICSID tribunals. In fact, BIT between developed and developing countries are negotiated to protect foreign investment from developing countries. This general characteristic of BIT reflects naturally on the provisions making them extremely protective for foreign investors. Naturally, developing countries seek to interpret restrictively BIT provisions, whereas developed countries try to interpret more expansively. As most of cases arising out of alleged violation of BIT are administered in the ICSID, a forum under the auspices of the World Bank, these Latin American countries have been raising the legitimacy deficit of the ICSID. The Argentine cases have been provoking many legal issues of international law, predicting crisis almost coming in actual investor-state arbitration system. Some Latin American countries, such as Bolivia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Argentina, already showed their dissatisfaction with the ICSID system considering withdrawing from it to minimize the eventual investor-state dispute. Thus the disagreement over umbrella clauses in their interpretation is becoming interpreted as an historical reflection on the continued tension between developing and developed countries on foreign investment. There is an academic and political discussion on the possible return of the Calvo Doctrine in Latin America. The paper will comment on these problems related to the interpretation of umbrella clause. The paper analyses ICSID cases involving principally Latin American countries to identify the critical legal issues arising between developing and developed countries. And the paper discusses alternatives in improving actual investor-State investment arbitration; inter alia, the introduction of an appellate system and treaty interpretation rules.

  • PDF

Green Chemistry at the present in Korea

  • Lee, Seung-Kyu;Park, Hyeon-Soo
    • Environmental Analysis Health and Toxicology
    • /
    • v.30 no.sup
    • /
    • pp.1.1-1.5
    • /
    • 2015
  • Objectives Despite the great contribution made by chemical substances to the development of modern civilization, their indiscriminate use has caused various kinds of damage to the global environment and human beings. Accordingly, the major developed countries and international society have tried to ensure the safe use of chemicals and a reduction in the use of hazardous chemicals through the establishment of the United Nations Environment Programme and various international agreements. In this reason, we tried to introduce about Green Chemistry progress at the present in worldwide and Korea. Methods We checked and analyzed relative journals, reports using keyword as like Green Chemistry, alternative chemicals, eco-friendly etc. and major country's government homepage search. Results Green Chemistry theory, which argues for the reduction or removal of harmfulness in chemicals throughout their entire life-cycle, has been spreading, and major developed countries, such as the US and Denmark, have developed and operate programs to provide reliable chemical information to help replace hazardous chemicals. Korea has also been conducting studies as like eco-innovation project. Through this project the "Alternative Chemical Search program," has been developed, distributed, and operated since 2011 to provide reliable information to small and medium-sized businesses that have difficulties collecting information to ensure conformity to international regulations. The program provides information that includes the regulations of major countries and Korea, information on 340 alternative chemicals, 70 application cases, and 1:1 consulting. Conclusions The Alternative Chemical Search program is expected to contribute to the establishment of response systems for regulation of Korean small and medium-sized businesses, and it also will be used to provide basic data for Korean hazardous chemical regulation, together with the Act on the Registration and Evaluation, etc. of Chemical Substances and the Chemical Control act, making it possible to establish an infrastructure for Green Chemistry in Korea and to increase national competitiveness.

A Study on Introduction of Private Investigation (민간조사(탐정)제도의 도입방향 - 경비업법 개정을 중심으로 -)

  • Lee, Sang-Won
    • Korean Security Journal
    • /
    • no.17
    • /
    • pp.235-253
    • /
    • 2008
  • In the developed countries, the private investigation system which is part of private security has developed together with police, and OECD countries except South Korea has developed the private investigation system establishing by the Private Investigation ACT. In Korea, there was several attempt to establish the Private Investigation ACT but it was not accomplished because of private security circumstances. In this study, the chapter Iis introduction, theoretical background is in chapter II, chapter III is the operation of private investigation of the developed countries, analysis and direction of the Private Investigation ACT in chapter IV, and conclusion in chapter V. To introduce the private investigation system, it is required to discover the problem of the Private Investigation ACT mentioned in this article and to develop the private investigation system by collecting the opnion of citizen, academic world, and the related agency. It is necessary to associated interest and effort of citizen, academic world, and the related agency for introdection of the private investigation system.

  • PDF

An Analysis on the R&D Productivity and Efficiency of Korea: Focused on Comparison with the OECD Countries (우리나라의 R&D 생산성 및 효율성 분석: OECD 국가와의 비교를 중심으로)

  • Kim, Young-H.;Kim, Sun-G.
    • Journal of Technology Innovation
    • /
    • v.19 no.1
    • /
    • pp.1-27
    • /
    • 2011
  • This paper aims to measure and analyze R&D productivities and efficiencies of 17 major OECD countries including Korea over the 1984-2008 period by using the Malmquist Productivity Index and Data Envelopment Analysis, classifying R&D performance into an output and outcome aspects. It also searches the Korea's current status and characteristics in each R&D stage to enhance Total Factor Productivity (TFP) compared with other developed countries. Our major findings are the followings: (i) Korea's productivity index of R&D input vis-a-vis R&D output is very high (13.39% annual growth rate) compared with those of major advanced countries, whereas the annual average of efficiency index is very low (0.33), i.e. Korea's technical efficiency index has risen to 0.83 at the last time series started at 0.10 point and come up to the level of major advanced countries. (ii) the Korea's productivity index of R&D output vis-a-vis R&D outcome is very low (14.02% annual reduction rate) compared with those of major advanced countries, whereas the annual average of efficiency index is very high (0.22), i.e. Korea's integrated frontier technical efficiency index has dropped to 0.057 at the last time series started at 1.00 point and coming up to the level of major advanced countries. (iii) The productivity of R&D input vis-a-vis R&D outcome is positively correlated with that of R&D output vis-a-vis R&D outcome and the growth of R&D input factors. In a nutshell, it implicates that the effort to take advantage of R&D outputs, namely establishing the diffusion and commercialization system of technical knowledge to the level of developed countries, should be strengthened over that on the growth of R&D investment and output for enhancing R&D productivity and efficiency in Korea.

  • PDF

The New International Division of Labor:Re-evaluation (신국제노동분업의 재평가)

  • 고태경
    • Journal of the Korean Regional Science Association
    • /
    • v.11 no.1
    • /
    • pp.79-91
    • /
    • 1995
  • As an exit to solve the economic depression of the development countries in the early twentieth century, the 'old international division of labor' developed. The economic crisis(i.e., under-consumption crisis) was due to the absence of the mode of regulation compatible with the extensive regime of accumulation(i.e., "Fordist" regime). The crisis was solved by the state intervention through the creation on institutions in order to increase the level of consumption. Until the late 1960s when "high Fordism" reached(i.e., a harmonious relation between the monopoly mode of regulation and the intensive accumulation of capital), the developed core countries enjoyed a remarkable economic growth. The external market was not a necessity for the economic growth because there were increases in labor productivity and proportional increases in real wages and thus increases in consumption level. In the 1970s, however, the core faced with economic crisis again. Due to the breakdown of the postwar "Fordist" regime of capital accumulation and the post 1973 world depression, the core needed the Third World as a solution for their internal and international economic crisis. Thus the 'new international division of labor'(NIDL) arose. The "Fordist" method of production(i.e., the divisions of production process) led to the territorial division of labor and to the detailed division of labor. The aim of the NIDL is to exploit reserve armies of labor on a world scale and thus to reduce production costs. According to the NIDL model, the Third World countries have been developing by the core countries' investment on mainly labor-intensive industries and thus have been playing an important role in the global economy. And the NIDL theorists argue that multinational corporations have increasingly invested in the Third World nations and contributed to the economic growth in those regions. Tables presented in the paper show that the global trend since the 1970s does not follow the argument exactly as the NIDL theorists predicted. On the contrary, the core countries focus on developing technology, adopting the automation of production process, and trading within the core countries rather than on investing in the periopheral countries. The continuing investment of multinational corporations into the periphery is not because of cheap labor force but because of the market potentials in the regions. Majority of corporations of the core tries to reduce production costs by investing in technological development more intensively and also by changing regional strategies (i.E., investment from metropolitan areas to medium - or small - size cities, focusing on agglomeration economy, boosting regional diversification, etc.) within their own countries. The main purpose of the paper is to review and to criticize the NIDL theory based on some empirical data.IDL theory based on some empirical data.

  • PDF

Perspectives on high throughput phenotyping in developing countries

  • Chung, Yong Suk;Kim, Ki-Seung;Kim, Changsoo
    • Korean Journal of Agricultural Science
    • /
    • v.45 no.3
    • /
    • pp.317-323
    • /
    • 2018
  • The demand for crop production is increasingly becoming steeper due to the rapid population growth. As a result, breeding cycles should be faster than ever before. However, the current breeding methods cannot meet this requirement because traditional phenotyping methods lag far behind even though genotyping methods have been drastically developed with the advent of next-generation sequencing technology over a short period of time. Consequently, phenotyping has become a bottleneck in large-scale genomics-based plant breeding studies. Recently, however, phenomics, a new discipline involving the characterization of a full set of phenotypes in a given species, has emerged as an alternative technology to come up with exponentially increasing genomic data in plant breeding programs. There are many advantages for using new technologies in phenomics. Yet, the necessity of diverse man power and huge funding for cutting-edge equipment prevent many researchers who are interested in this area from adopting this new technique in their research programs. Currently, only a limited number of groups mostly in developed countries have initiated phenomic studies using high throughput methods. In this short article, we describe the strategies to compete with those advanced groups using limited resources in developing countries, followed by a brief introduction of high throughput phenotyping.

The Role of Korean Hospice Care in the Asia Pacific Hospice Palliative Care Society (아시아 태평양 지역의 호스피스.완화의료에서 한국 호스피스의 역할)

  • Hong, Young-Seon
    • Journal of Hospice and Palliative Care
    • /
    • v.14 no.3
    • /
    • pp.138-143
    • /
    • 2011
  • Korean hospice care has been greatly developed in a short period of time, thanks to help of foreign specialists and aids from developed countries. With enormous growth in economy, Korea which once received foreign aids now give help to other countries. It is the time for the Korean hospice society to consider ways to make an international contribution. That way, Korea could help terminal patients both in Korea and neighboring countries overcome sufferings, maintain their dignity as human beings until the end of their lives and have a comfortable moment of death. Thus, we need to think about ways to contribute to the international hospice society and make related plans.

Development of the Transmission Line Design System for Overseas Projects (해외사업용 송전선로 설계시스템 개발)

  • Min, Byeong-Wook;Kim, Jong-Hwa;Choi, Seok-June;Bang, Hang-Kwon;Choi, Han-Yeol
    • Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
    • /
    • 2006.11a
    • /
    • pp.129-131
    • /
    • 2006
  • KEPCO constructed the first 765kV 2 circuit transmission line in the world with its home grown technologies. Through this 765kV transmission system project, KEPCO accumulated experience and technologies related to the 765 kV power system. Based on the successful completion of the 765kV transmission project, KEPCO is conducting overseas business by using its abundant experience and know-how. In particular, KEPCO developed the training course for power system, called the ATT (Advanced Transmission Technology) training courses for overseas business, especially for developing countries. Therefore, KEPCO developed the "Transmission line design system for overseas projects". This system supports the calculation of wind pressure load, tower design, wire selection, insulation design, etc. by applying the meteorological data of foreign countries and design standards. And this system is applied to the training program so that the trainees can design the optimal transmission line for their own countries.

  • PDF