Labour Provisions in Free Trade Agreements : Fostering their Consistency with the ILO Standards System

In the past two decades, bilateral and regional trade agreements with labour provisions have proliferated rapidly. Consequently, labour standards have become more decentralized across the globe as various States use them in varying forms, and with various effects, within international trade. One of the major questions this decentralization raises is how such a structure fits with the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) corpus of international labour standards. While the insertion of these provisions could provide a way to increase labour standards enforcement, the trade partners may be confronted with uncertainty in determining the implications of these standards, which threatens, among others, their uniform application and thereby the international protection they afford.This paper explores the implications of ILO labour standards in trade agreements. It first examines the trends among various States parties as to how ILO instruments are referred to in trade agreements and then analyses the legal consequences of those references. Finally, the paper considers various options for utilising the mechanisms within the ILO’s mandate that could provide guidance on the incorporation and implementation of these labour standards. Among others, the relevant trade bodies could turn to the ILO for increased capacity building and guidance to help ensure that the relevant provisions in trade agreements work in synergy with the international labour standards system