Similarly, another cause for concern is that investment agreements generally contain provisions enabling private investors to sue states if investment conditions change over time. This has led to litigation regarding states’ measures to protect public-policy objectives, such as health or the environment. Investor–state arbitration has drawn fierce criticism, including for lack of transparency, preventing third parties from accessing the system – and thus solutions – and benefiting ‘transnational corporations at the cost of states’ sovereign functions of legislation and adjudication’.236 The UN Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) Convention on Transparency in Treaty-Based Investor-State Arbitration has been pointed to as providing an opportunity for increased investor–state arbitrations transparency.237 Human rights impact assessments As noted earlier, in 2011, the Special Rapporteur on the right to food presented Guiding Principles on human rights impact assessments of trade and investment agreements (the ‘Guiding Principles on trade and investment’). These have since garnered considerable support from human rights advocates and development practitioners worldwide. A human rights impact assessment is a tool that informs policy choices by preventing and remedying adverse human rights effects, and ensures that these are made based on the best available information.238 A state may have to make choices about its priorities, for instance, where trade and investment agreements contribute to economic growth and thus facilitate the state’s ability to realise rights through mobilising budgetary resources, while at the same time such agreements negatively affect the state’s capacity to protect the rights of certain groups, such as workers in the state’s least efficient economic sectors. Human rights impact assessments can help identify the best choice among competing policy options for mobilising resources; identify both positive and negative human rights impacts of a trade or investment agreement; and help states prioritise those economic and social benefits that can make a sustainable contribution to the realisation of all human rights, over the short-term economic and/or political gains such agreements provide.239 The process of setting priorities and managing tradeoffs, as well as the substance of outcomes, must all comply with human rights-related transparency, participation and non-discrimination principles.240 A human rights impact assessment requires taking the country’s unique context into consideration and examining ‘the fiscal and economic sustainability of trade and investment agreements’.241 Therefore, human rights and environmental impact assessments are particularly advisable242 since environmental degradation can reduce the long-term revenue that natural resources yield. 236 Eg, ‘Interim report of the Special Rapporteur on health, Anand Grover’ (2014) UN Doc A/69/299, para 4. 237 ‘Report of the Working Group on business and human rights’ (Improving policy coherence for inclusive and sustainable development) (2015) UN Doc A/HRC/29/28. 238 ‘Report of the Special Rapporteur on food, Olivier De Schutter’ (Guiding principles on human rights impact assessments of trade and investment agreements) (2011) UN Doc A/HRC/19/59/Add.5, para 6.2. 239 Guiding Principles on Human Rights Impact Assessments of Trade and Investment Agreements, para. 6.1. 240 Guiding Principles on Human Rights Impact Assessments of Trade and Investment Agreements, para. 6.1. 241 Guiding Principles on Human Rights Impact Assessments of Trade and Investment Agreements, para 2.4. 242 ‘Report of the Working Group on business and human rights’ (Visit to Ghana) (2014) UN Doc A/HRC/26/25/Add.5. 62 The Obligation to Mobilise Resources: Bridging Human Rights, Sustainable Development Goals, and Economic and Fiscal Policies   December 2017