If not now, when? - the scope of Article 79 CISG in light of the Covid-19 pandemic

This chapter examines the question of whether the impacts on commercial parties arising from governmental responses to Covid-19 are capable of supporting exemptions from liability for damages under Article 79 of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods. The chapter examines the ways in which those responses impacted commercial parties, and how the systemic interaction between those impacts distinguishes the impediments they present from concepts such as financial hardship and other factors traditionally raised and, in appropriate cases, accepted as impediments. Accepting that such an interpretation requires stretching the bounds of Article 79 jurisprudence, in the face of what was an unprecedented global pandemic with unparalleled impacts on international trade, the author argues that these cases require a unique response. In making that argument, the author concludes that these systemic impediments are, or at least should be, capable of satisfying the requirements of Article 79.