Less developed countriesŽ policy space in the emerging governance regime to food safety: Uruguayan trade negotiations to access high quality meat markets

This paper examines two case studies from Uruguay which involve international trade negotiations to set high quality meat (beef and sheep) standards in order to access high income markets. Both cases include the intervention of the various actors of the international governance regime to food safety (multilateral actors, like the Codex, the OIE or the WTO, as well as bilateral actors, like the Europe Union or the U.S.). They also involve the Uruguayan government, its animal health agencies and the local private sector from the whole meat value chain. These two case studies illustrate quite accurately how a less developed country can increase its national policy space in the context of the emerging experimentalist transnational governance regime in food safety. They contribute to show that without the creation of local capabilities, such as the meat traceability policy in Uruguay, a voice-instead-of-silence strategy from less developed countries in order to impact on the international regulation framework of food safety is hardly possible.