CETA

The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) was concluded in 2014 between the European Union and Canada. It entered into provisional application in September 2017.

The agreement covers most aspects of new generation trade deals, including intellectual property, public procurements, regulatory cooperation, services and elimination of tariffs.

It also includes an investment chapter with a revised investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) mechanism, dubbed investment court system. Many critics on both sides of the Atlantic say that this new system is largely window-dressing and does not address the core of the problem behind investor-state dispute measures which enable foreign corporations to sue states if they deem their profits or investment potentials affected by new laws or changes in policy.

Photo: Council of Canadians

(March 2020)