Usa Vs. Venezuela Wto Case

In 1990 the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) promulgated, declaring a new statutory or administrative law, the "Gasoline Rule" to the Clean Air Act. The purpose of this was to reduce air pollution in the U.S. by reducing the emission effects of gasoline. Starting January 1st, 1995, "the Gasoline Rule permitted only gasoline of a specified cleanliness ("reformulated gasoline") to be sold to consumers in the most polluted areas of the country." (WTO) As for the rest of the country the Gasoline Rule states, "only gasoline no dirtier than that sold in the base year of 1990 ("conventional gasoline") could be sold." (WTO) This rule was to apply to domestic gasoline suppliers as well as foreign suppliers importing into the U.S. However, in order to improve domestic gasoline sales, the U.S. applied even stricter rules on gasoline from foreign suppliers. This hurt the sales of, and upset foreign suppliers, specifically Venezuela and Brazil.

Coincidentally, the World Trade Organization (WTO) officially commenced on January 1st, 1995. The WTO was created mainly to maintain a fair path to international commerce for all nations involved. In order to maintain that fairness, the WTO sought to eliminate nations from discriminating against foreign suppliers in order to improve a nations domestic business. On January 23rd, 1995 Venezuela filed a complaint to the WTO Dispute Settlement Body for exactly that, discrimination. The question of the dispute was, "whether the US measure discriminated against imported gasoline and in favor of domestic refineries." (WTO)

Once Venezuela filed a complaint against the US, Venezuela claimed that the US specifically violated the "national treatment" principle, which is basically the term used for discrimination. Venezuela went on to claim that this violation, "could not be justified under exceptions to normal WTO rules for health and environmental