NOLAN INTERNATIONAL SYMPOSIUM (2ND INTL SYMP ON LAWS & THEIR APPLICATIONS FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT)
Editors: F. Kongoli, M. McNeil, Y. Hayakawa, M. Dibra.

The main 10 problems of the world are classified in 2 groups. The first group consist of 4 of them: (1) Pollution, (2) Methane, (3) Arctic Amplification and (4) Global Warming. The second group (5) Geopolitics (6) Wars, (7) Social & Job & Youth, (8) Countries Deep State and corruption, mafia, lobbies, bureaucracy, (9) Fossil Fuel Energy System and the (10) For-Profit Economy. In this article, a social, political and legal analysis of these phenomena is carried out and proper conclusions are drawn that show that the situation is acute and need activated action.

Judicial systems around the world may be divided in two major groups: common and civil law system. Common Law systems are mainly used in UK, USA, Canada and the civil law systems are used in Europe and other countries. There are also countries or states/provinces that have mix systems like Quebec where criminal matters use mainly common law system and civil matters use civil law systems and in manty cases both methods of both systems are used interchangeably. A somewhat indirect product of the systems is the way that the judges are appointed or elected. In this paper a comparative analysis of both systems and their elected or appointed judges is carried out with all his advantaged and disadvantages.

Fair and free competition in the market enhances economic welfare and ultimately consumer welfare. Competition law, then, creates market conditions that promote fair play and thus creates a situation whereby the most creative competitors with the best efficiencies are rewarded with the best profits.
The current digital age, combined with the increasing focus on sustainability, have introduced many challenges for competition law and its policy, and have disturbed established approaches to competition law across the globe. This situation has led to international and national discussions, which have resulted in some jurisdictions, such as the EU, introducing first new laws and policies. Other jurisdictions, such as Australia, are still considering the best way to address the digital-age challenges for competition law.
However, this ongoing introduction of new laws and policies specifically adapted for competition law in the digital market is not sustainable, in particular because the digital world is highly innovative and is evolving at extreme speeds.
This article addresses the term ‘sustainability’ from two perspectives, marrying the two perspectives together: first, the sustainability of the law, in particular of competition law; second, sustainability as the central notion in the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 goals.
In this article, I start by exploring how competition law can support the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development using a teleological approach by analysing competition law’s objective(s) and its role in connection with the Sustainable Development goals. Once I outline the exact synergies, I put them in the context of some of the challenges that competition law faces in the digital age. I then discuss the sustainability for competition law in the digital economy. In that regard, I put forward arguments for maintaining the status quo of the general competition-law rules. I explain that for competition law to be sustainable and to enhance the particular UN Sustainable Development goals, it is the interpretation of competition law, as well as its policies and approaches, that need to be adjusted, rather than the general competition-law rules.
This article stands on qualitative research, utilising, doctrinal, economic-legal, historic-legal, comparative and jurisprudential methods.

Much has been written over the past decades on the deleterious effects bribery and corruption have on economic development and sustainability. . It comes by many names: bribery, kickbacks, grease, soborno, baksheesh, rusvet, mordida, just to name a few. But regardless of the moniker, the impact is usually the same. Whether it concerns provision of basic public services like electricity, public health, or water, to lost revenue from tax dodgers, to individual firms getting preference on sales or service contracts, bribery often acts as a deadweight loss to social welfare and inhibits growth and often sustainability goals. Even humanitarian aid is not immune. But it is part of the fabric of many countries, despite laws enacted and aggressive international efforts to combat it. In some countries it is viewed as necessary to “get things done” when dealing with underpaid public servants, or as a way to facilitate otherwise valid transactions. But when does a transaction cross over from “facilitating” to “debilitating” for an economy, and do such payments ever really advance sustainability objectives? And, are current laws effective in combatting corruption or is more work needed to maximize growth prospects for developing and developed economies? We will examine these questions and consider impacts of corruption, current anticorruption efforts and the realities of the current global environment.

The goal of the ZPF Research Project is to study, define and produce with the free work of some Italian top level experts, a new technological system able to produce from water a new ZPF fuel based on hydrogen at acceptable cost. In this paper the fundamentals of the novel idea is explained and the importance of creating this zero pollution fuel has on society. The project will be based on public funding and through a Science & Social Sinergy pact between the ZPF-Zero Pollution Fuel not-for-profit Association and the Catholic Church probably the first science-social Project in the world.

The current economic context of Globalization and COVID restrictions is marked by a growing number of companies restructuring and an increased unemployment rate resulting from company closures and downsizing. Therefore, it seems important to address the employee issue of job security and the need to reduce the negative impacts that some restructuring processes have on business and employees. One of the solutions in this regard is to ensure that employees are heard during the restructuring process. Since the Canadian legal framework on the subject offers insufficient protections, the goal of this article is to find solutions to strengthen the existing framework and to find possibilities for adopting other legal information and consultation procedures applicable to company restructuring in general in Canada. To this end, the author is interested in whether a process of information and consultation of workers in restructuring matters involving collective redundancies, similar to what exists in the European Union is possible at the federal level in Canada and the province of Quebec in light of the Capability for voice. As a theoretical framework, we have applied the «capability for voice», developed by Amartya Sen, which provides a method of assessing the impact and relevance of laws that recognize extended participation rights to employees regarding company economic decisions. In doing so, our work assesses the extent that the Canadian Laws and collective agreements, related to the subject matter under study, meet the four criteria of the «capability for voice», which are prerequisites to pass from the involvement stage of the employees in company decisions to their real influence on such issues. The author has also used the method of comparative law, to compare and find the best examples, on the matter at study, among various Canadian legislations. In the previous published articles the author has dealt with the employee participation rights and the «Capability for voice» in British Law and the European Union directives. In this article the author concentrates on the Canadien legal framework and the collective agreements on the subject in order to demonstrate that the protections offered by the Canadian federal Laws and the provincial laws and collective agreements on the subject are relatively weak and offer inadequate protections. In addition, by applying the «Capability for voice» we have drawn some important lessons to strengthen the existing Canadian legal framework of employee participation rights and consider a new, comprehensive framework that will apply to all types of restructuring and not only to collective redundancies and technological changes. Given that Canada is somehow interventionist in some regards to the determination of labor standards, it seems that it is possible to have a better legal framework for employee participation in Canada taking into consideration the suggestions that we have made in strengthening the «capability for voice». This work is part of the author’s Ph.D. thesis conducted at the Faculty of Law of the University of Montreal, Canada and it constitutes the first in-depth study on the right of employees to participate in restructuring, which compares and applies the analytical framework of the «capability for voice» to all Canadian federal laws, provincial laws and some collective agreements as well as all the European Directives and UK laws on the matter.

On its face, free trade would appear to foster sustainable development as free trade optimizes the use of limited resources for the greatest gains in overall social welfare. The picture, however, is far more complicated. Free trade can be disruptive to local economies, by disturbing existing industries and employment in sectors that face foreign competition. As countries develop new more efficient industries they challenge existing industries and cause disruption in those markets. In addition, national governments have basic obligations to provide food, jobs, maintain health and a clean environment, and promote local industries which may conflict with free trade principles as they may choose protect threatened industries or reduce trade in products for other reasons like climate change. The discussion of free and fair trade often enters the lexicon, as well as the need to protect local agriculture and industry so a country can feed and employ its people. Some countries abuse trade by subsidizing industries they wish to promote as export platforms and thereby distorting resource allocations. Of course “fair trade” is also sometimes misused as a tool to shield local industry from foreign competition. WTO rules designed to correct predatory pricing like antidumping, countervailing duty, and safeguards regimes may be abused as a backdoor means of permitting protectionist policies to limit trade. In some cases the balance of political forces requires forms of “managed” trade in sensitive sectors. Finally, while regional trade agreements promote trade, the trade is limited to those inside the free trade arrangement. These issues have come to define in part the “antiglobalization” movement and the trend toward “onshoring” production of critical industries. In this session we will explore these issues and ask the question: what is the right balance for countries to promote free trade while ensuring sustainability in the local economy?

We will provide a legal overview of Thailand’s Model Production Sharing Contract and high light several provisions. Any additional time will be dedicated to better understand COVID impacts and the force majeure clause, its meaning and possible uses throughout Asia. This legal overview is timely and relevant as Thailand prepares for the next offshore bid round for oil and gas blocks, this time featuring a production sharing contract and not its standard concession agreement. We will also offer the Model Form Production Sharing Contract as issued for the Department of Mineral Fuels for the Ministry of Energy in the Kingdom of Thailand.

There are more than 32,000 golf courses worldwide, with a rate of development
increasing annually, along with their adverse impacts on the environment. And for the
last 20 years, the world has seen a considerable proliferation of golf courses in Asia owing
to sustained economic growth in the region. Moreover, golf has become the preferred
sport amongst Asians nowadays and many governments have adopted “golf tourism” as
national policy to spur economic growth. The Philippines, for instance, boasts of seventyeight
golf clubs compared with just 20 courses from two decades ago. Thailand has 222
courses, Viet Nam is hurriedly catching up with twenty-eight and Singapore has eighteen
golf clubs with twenty-six courses. These figures are increasing steadily at an average
rate of two new courses being constructed annually.
Most of these golf courses are considered “traditional” or conventional, because they
pursue a particular mode of construction and management, i.e. prodigious use of
chemicals, water, white sand or pebbles, and hybrid turf grasses - not only to ensure the
playing quality of the surface but also aesthetically to enhance the greens and a
substantial portion of the golf course (tees, fairways). Moreover, most courses are built
either on pristine or un-spoilt lands, hilly plains and mountainous areas for breathtaking
landscapes and challenging games. During the construction and landscaping stage, the
earth-moving activities generally destroy topsoil, re-direct riverine and wild life habitats,
as well as damage ecosystems. But mostly, golf courses have converted vast tracts of
agricultural lands, particularly paddy fields, which bring trepidations about food
security in the region.
Significantly, the “traditional” or conventional method of construction and operation of golf
courses is causing adverse environmental, health, social and economic impacts. Firstly,
golf courses require vast tracks of land for the construction of complexes. These lands
could either be agricultural, hilly or mountainous areas, reclaimed marine or coastal
areas, or mostly state lands. Secondly, golf courses use large quantities of chemicals, which
are highly toxic and can also bio-accumulate in organisms. Chemicals also pose risks to
people exposed to them. Thus, there is a need to regulate the use of these chemicals
(fertilizers, pesticides, herbicides, fungicides and coagulants). The problem is exacerbated
in developing countries, where government policies encourage agro-chemical use as
chemicals are seen as production enhancers – similarly, substantial chemical application
has become the popular “culture” in turf grass management in golf courses.

The last three years has been characterized by two phenomena: (1) an increase of CH4 percentage in the air, in addition to the increase of the so called standard GHGs such as the CO2 and N2O and (2) the lowering ice thickness of the Arctic Sea Ice. Based on an analysis of the available public data, the consequences of these two phenomena are reviewed, their risk analysed in social and legal aspects, and solutions are proposed.

The first part of the presentation will take a look at a statistical analysis of the worldwide filings of patents by technology area, emerging trends, and filings by country. The second part of the presentation will take a look at international or foreign filing strategies including key markets of interest to certain businesses, what filing routes to select and how to balance time, disclosure, and cost issues. The third part of the presentation will focus on a recap of hot topics in US patent law for 2022 and predictions for 2023 impacting various industries.

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