Salini Costruttori v Morocco
ICSID · Investment (ICSID and treaty) · Morocco · 23 July 2001
Why it matters
Salini Costruttori S.p.A. and Italstrade S.p.A. v. Kingdom of Morocco, an investment-treaty arbitration administered by ICSID (case no. ARB/00/4), in which a foreign investor brought claims against a state under an investment treaty. In the outcome, jurisdiction was upheld, with the tribunal establishing the influential "Salini test" for what counts as an investment. For a student, it is a worked example of investor-state dispute settlement: how an ICSID tribunal weighs a state's right to regulate against the treaty protections owed to foreign investors.
Summary
Salini Costruttori S.p.A. and Italstrade S.p.A. v. Kingdom of Morocco: an ICSID award (ARB/00/4). Jurisdiction upheld; the award established the Salini test for what counts as an investment. The tribunal's full reasoning is set out in the original.
The detail
Parties: Salini Costruttori S.p.A. and Italstrade S.p.A. v. Kingdom of Morocco
Case number: ICSID Case No. ARB/00/4
Outcome: Jurisdiction upheld: building a highway counted as an investment.
Applicable law: ICSID Convention Article 25; Italy-Morocco bilateral investment treaty.
Issues in play: What does the word investment in the ICSID Convention actually mean, when the Convention itself never defines it?
Read the full decision at italaw ↗
Locus Standi links to the source decision and publishes its own plain-language summary. It does not reproduce the text of the award.