Although services facilitation is recent topic of discussion at the World Trade Organization, it is not novel in the context of regional trade agreements (RTAs), where... READ MORE

With a growing number of transactions available on the internet, the interconnection between regulatory issues creates unprecedented complexities for both transaction... READ MORE

As industrial policies become more widespread and controversial, the relationship between international investment agreements (IIAs) and industrial policy measures has... READ MORE

In recent years, investment facilitation has taken an important place in the investment policy debate. This paper provides an overview on how investment facilitation i... READ MORE

In the twenty-first century, World Trade Organization (WTO) members have put great energy and creativity in liberalising trade through regional trade agreements (RTAs)... READ MORE

This paper examines the reasons behind the underutilisation of dispute settlement mechanisms in regional trade agreements (RTAs). It suggests that countries could use... READ MORE

Dispute settlement rules and procedures are an important component of so-called mega-regional trade agreements. Reacting to recurrent criticism of the legitimacy of di... READ MORE

The importance of regional trade agreements (RTAs) and their dispute settlement mechanisms (DSMs) will likely continue to grow considering the dynamics of the multilat... READ MORE

In the rapidly developing digital economy, where user-generated content is on the rise, and end-users are no longer just consuming content, but also developing, upload... READ MORE

The digital transformation has facilitated old modes of trade and business models and enabled the creation of entirely new ones. Digital disruption is being felt acros... READ MORE

As the United Kingdom negotiates its exit from the European Union, rules of origin are becoming a key topic. Whatever form the future UK-EU trade relationship wil... READ MORE

The value of exports from Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) started to recover in 2016, and increased a notable 13.2% year-on-year in the first half of 2017. The r... READ MORE

This year’s report focuses on regional trade, the most common form of trade for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). It finds that deep regional trade... READ MORE

The withdrawal of the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in early 2017 led the remaining 11 countries in that trade and investment agreement to exp... READ MORE

This paper examines the need to encourage more widespread and inclusive participation of micro, small, and medium enterprises in global markets as a component of the S... READ MORE

The aim of this paper is threefold: First, it attempts to provide an inventory of the various legal disciplines and obligations found within RTAs that impact digital tra... READ MORE

China has become the world’s largest exporter, with a rapid rise in its world trade share just after it joined the WTO in 2001. This column finds that China&rsqu...; READ MORE

This report uses econometric modelling and analysis to examine how Canada and other TPP signatories would fare under a TPP11; what the U.S. stands to lose; and, how th... READ MORE

The purpose of this publication is to disseminate information on national experiences, best practices and recommendations with respect to the establishment and functio... READ MORE

Despite agriculture’s modest contribution to GDP in all three partner countries, agricultural issues will be a thorny aspect of the NAFTA renegotiation—jus... READ MORE

After promising last year to terminate US participation in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), President Donald Trump has opted for renegotiation in sever... READ MORE

The Trump administration’s strategy toward trade agreements in general, and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in particular, is fundamentally mispl... READ MORE

Against the background of rising anti-globalisation sentiment, this report argues that, while there are good reasons for some people to be angry, trade is not the root... READ MORE

The Trump administration has issued a wide array of often technical executive actions, “self-initiated” investigations, and other steps related to trade si... READ MORE

The debate over regional trade agreements is ongoing. It has been argued that they can heighten exposure to shocks as they lead to more specialisation, and conversely... READ MORE

As countries are increasingly concluding bilateral and regional Preferential Trade Agreements (PTAs), diverging rules of origin regulations and procedures are becoming... READ MORE

There is a large empirical literature examining the effects of free trade agreements. However, most studies to date have focused on a common average effect across all... READ MORE

Tariff barriers today are small on average, suggesting only limited welfare gains from their removal. This column argues, however, that the current generation of stand... READ MORE

Global economic activity is picking up with a long-awaited cyclical recovery in investment, manufacturing, and trade, according to Chapter 1 of this World Economic Out... READ MORE

In this study the authors argue that the benefits from opening trade are broad and deep. Trade liberalization has generated higher living standards through greater pro... READ MORE

The 2017 Macroreport considers recent developments in the global economy and how they may affect Latin America and the Caribbean. It reviews how countries are adapting... READ MORE

With the rise of deep-integration regional trade agreements (RTAs), the role of sustainable development has become an inevitable discussion. Recent agreements reflect a t... READ MORE

Latin America’s economic downturn seems finally to have bottomed out. Positive, if modest, growth is forecast for this year. But as the region recovers from the... READ MORE

This paper examines the need to encourage more widespread and inclusive participation of micro, small, and medium enterprises in global markets as a component of the Sust... READ MORE

This paper examines the opportunity that regulatory cooperation provides to rationalise the array of overlapping international regulatory systems going forward, and the r... READ MORE

The emergence of global value chains (GVCs) and global public goods presents an opportunity for the World Trade Organization (WTO) to play a larger role in international... READ MORE

This book proposes a renewal of 'Open Regionalism' in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) aimed at achieving the region's goals of high growth with stabi... READ MORE

Across Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), governments are asking how they can spur growth in a challenging and uncertain global context. The region can ill afford... READ MORE

The debate over imposing a 20 percent border adjustment tax against Mexico has raised a number of questions, but one of the most imponderable is whether and how Mexico... READ MORE

As promised throughout the campaign, one of the first acts carried out by President Donald Trump was to order the US Trade Representative to withdraw formally from the... READ MORE

In May of 2016 the United States International Trade Commission (ITC) issued its assessment of the impact of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). This paper highlights... READ MORE

This paper examines the key elements bearing upon regional integration in Africa. It argues that integration should be conceived as a a means to respond to the develop... READ MORE

This paper aims to provide an understanding of West Africa’s potential for participation in GVCs. Upgrading strategies require identifying value chains in which... READ MORE

This report provides a conceptual foundation for the analysis of international regulatory co-operation (IRC) and its potential benefits through reduced trade costs. Di... READ MORE

The Asian Economic Integration Report 2016: What drives foreign direct investment in Asia and the Pacific? is ADB’s annual report on Asia’s regional econom... READ MORE

The objective of this paper is to provide policymakers in the fields of trade and sustainable development with a brief overview of the main elements and potential impl... READ MORE

Out of the Border Labyrinth: An Assessment of Trade Facilitation Initiatives in Latin America and the Caribbean sheds entirely new light on the trade effects... READ MORE

This Policy Brief reviews US trade and investment policy programs focused on global development, such as the Generalized System of Preferences and the African Growth a... READ MORE

In this paper Dr. Jerzewska reviews the key criticism of ISDS in the context of new FTA negotiations taking place, the recent changes to the ISDS mechanism and the fut... READ MORE

Co-published by the World Economic Forum and the Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, the Report features the Enabling Trade Index, which evaluates 136 economies ba... READ MORE

Trade agreements involving the US could be the first economic casualty of the 2016 election. The existing US trade agreements rose from the ashes of WWII and the Great... READ MORE

This paper reviews reciprocal and unilateral preferential rules of origin, including the possibility of introducing expanded cumulation flexibilities to show why they are... READ MORE

Free trade is under fire, with evidence documenting the distributional impacts and labour adjustment costs of trade liberalisation mounting. This column instead presen... READ MORE

This is an overview report of the Rules of Origin Dialogue held November 21-22, 2016. The report report provides an analysis and evaluation of rules of origin in the cont... READ MORE

Access to preferential import tariffs under a free trade agreement (FTA) is governed by clearly defined rules of origin designed to prevent non-members from enjoying the... READ MORE

The ongoing stalemate on the Harmonization Work Programme (HWP) with respect to non-preferential rules of origin (RoO) has left business trade negotiators and customs off... READ MORE

As negotiators pursue talks on a workable agricultural safeguard mechanism at the World Trade Organization, it is critical that they have access to up-to-date and reli... READ MORE

The Trade and Integration Monitor 2016 analyzes the different aspects of a downshifting in world trade and its effects on Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). This i... READ MORE

The election of Donald Trump has closed the door to consideration of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) during the lame duck session of Congress this year. During the... READ MORE

This report explores the implications of China’s One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative on the politics and economics of Central Asia. The analysis calls into ques... READ MORE

A China-UK free trade agreement has been extensively discussed since the UK’s vote for Brexit. Many supporters of Brexit argue that the UK’s regained flexi... READ MORE

The report examines three critical and relatively understudied drivers of competitiveness: Economies of agglomeration: firms and workers accrue benefits from locating... READ MORE

The 2016 World Trade Report examines the participation of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in international trade, how the international trade landscape is ch... READ MORE

It appears likely that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) will come up for a vote in the lame duck session to be held after the presidential elections. How should we... READ MORE

Global value chains (GVCs) have become a major feature of the 21st century economy. This paper argues that the expansion and increased sophistication of GVCs has creat... READ MORE

The Belt and Road aims to ease bottlenecks for cross-border trade in Asia, Europe and Africa. This paper measures empirically whether the reduction in transportation c... READ MORE

This paper leaves aside the issue of EU reform and focuses on the desirable EU-UK relationship after Brexit. The authors argue that none of the existing models of part... READ MORE

One of the most widely used techniques for evaluating the economic impact of regional trading agreements is numerical simulation with computable general equilibrium mo... READ MORE

In his latest attack on US trade policy, Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump has threatened to exit the 163-country World Trade Organization (WTO), which... READ MORE

New EU trade agreements could adversely affect Turkey as a non-EU member. This column presents new findings of an economic analysis in which different trade policy sce... READ MORE

Will the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) pass this year? If not, when? With Brexit on the horizon, how long would a US-UK free trade agreement (FTA) really take? With... READ MORE

This piece explores questions around the changing global trading architecture over the past 15 years. It examines how these changes have impacted on Africa’s eco... READ MORE

Given the diversity of Asia and the capacity constraints of countries in the region to manage integration, building an integrated Asian market is not easy. Because reg... READ MORE

Trade facilitation should be viewed as a strategic issue rather than a technical one. While ASEAN has been successful in the phasing out of intra-regional tariffs, ASE... READ MORE

In recent months, trade agreements have moved from the arcane pages of academic journals to the front pages of newspapers, from university lecture halls to the preside... READ MORE

Regional integration is a development priority for Africa. All Africans, not just policy makers and decision makers, have a role to play in making integration a realit... READ MORE

The global trade regime is undergoing fundamental changes. While World Trade Organization (WTO) member countries continue to work towards an ever elusive agreement, re... READ MORE

On February 4, 2016, after five years of negotiations, the members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) signed the trade pact, considered to be the highest... READ MORE

The authors estimate the adjustment costs of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) on workers and compare these costs with the agreement's benefits. They also estima... READ MORE

After five and a half years of negotiations, the Barack Obama administration concluded the most ambitious free trade deal of the postwar era on October 5, 2015. The Tr... READ MORE

This issue of the Asia Regional Integration Center's bimonthly newsletter provides the latest news on trade, investment, cross-border infrastructure, and regional... READ MORE

To decide which of these studies is more credible, three questions should be asked: First, is the model that is used appropriate for exploring trade policy? Second, ha... READ MORE

This study takes stock of the institutional setting, operational modalities, strengths and weaknesses of various forms of mutual recognition when used in different sec... READ MORE

This paper examines the implications of this new era of regionalism and offers recommendations on how the system of RTAs can best be leveraged to advance trade and dev... READ MORE

Trade friction today is largely due to regulatory diversity as contemporary markets are chiefly segmented through non-tariff barriers. The purpose of the paper is to e... READ MORE

World trade has experienced a significant slowdown since the 2008 financial crisis. Over this period, the global ratio of trade expansion to income growth has halved.... READ MORE

This brief seeks to examine the various geographically proximate African FTAs in the context of analyzing the deeper and expand models of economic integration and ende... READ MORE

Over the past two decades, regional trade agreements (RTAs) have proliferated alongside the WTO system, involving a wide variety of agreements. In the absence of signi... READ MORE

Assessing Regional Integration in Africa VII examines how the three elements of regional integration, innovation and competitiveness are interlinked. It explores the p... READ MORE

On October 4, 2015, 12 Pacific Rim countries concluded negotiations on the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. If ratified, the agreement could raise member cou... READ MORE

This Working Paper estimates the effects of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) using a comprehensive, quantitative trade model, updating results reported in... READ MORE

This paper addresses the question of whether it is possible to balance the need for a free flow of information across borders with legitimate government concerns relat... READ MORE

Of all the free trade agreements (FTAs) concluded by Korea with its major trading partners since the turn of the century, the Korea-China FTA may the largest in trade... READ MORE

This report discuss how Canada should focus on five priority trade deals to open markets and benefit its financial services sector, according to a new report by the C.... READ MORE

On January 13, 2012, President Obama released a proposed reorganization of the federal bureaucracy, which would see the U.S. Department of Commerce, the Office of the... READ MORE

The establishment of the WTO Agreement on TRIPS (Trade Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights) and the proliferation of plurilateral, bilateral and regional a... READ MORE

The global trade and investment architecture (GTIA) plays a critical role in shaping the organisation and structure of international commerce – from production a... READ MORE

The G20’s principal task of reviving global economic growth has never been easy – it is harder now that world trade is contracting. World trade growth isn&... READ MORE

Making domestic regulation more coherent and expanding cooperation between regulators has the promise of lowering the unnecessary costs of regulation for companies and... READ MORE

This paper discussed the need for the United States to have a comprehensive economic strategy toward the Asia-Pacific, a region that will do more to determine U.S. int... READ MORE

This is the 13th issue of the ARIC newsletter focused on cross-border infrastructure, trade, investment, money, finance and regional public goods. The November-Decembe... READ MORE

Safeguard measures are designed for application when sudden and unexpected import surges cause or threaten to cause harm to domestic industry; recognising that even fa... READ MORE

This paper provides an analytical treatment of trade and welfare responses to trade cost change in a simple two-country model. To explore the model's implications... READ MORE

This paper explores the long-term challenges for trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). The region has emerge... READ MORE

Recent data show that the institutional content of preferential trade agreements has evolved over time. Although pre-1990s preferential trade agreements mostly focused... READ MORE

This think-piece reports the findings of a mapping exercise of the competition-related provisions of 216 free trade agreements (FTAs) included in the World Trade Organ... READ MORE

Despite a lack of consensus among Korea, Korean official recognize that -- sooner or later -- Korea will need to be part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). Jreffr... READ MORE

Korea's decision to delay joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) talks was a tactical mistake. It is now left with primarily two options to participate: (1) a... READ MORE

This paper assesses how RTAs impact growth volatility on a sample of 170 countries, between 1978-2012. The findings show that the benefits outweigh the costs as RTAs a... READ MORE

This piece provides an update on the latest Presidential Summit of the Pacific Alliance and the commitments made by member Presidents to deepen integration and improve... READ MORE

This paper analyzes the impacts of selected trade facilitation measures on international trade flows. A gravity model is used to estimate four equations: a pooled cros... READ MORE

Building on a careful analysis of Southeast Asia’s recent history, politics, economics, and place within the Asia Pacific, this report looks forward two decades... READ MORE

Although Brazil has become one of the largest economies in the world, it remains among the most closed economies as measured by the share of exports and imports in gro... READ MORE

For Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), Asia has gone from an afterthought to a centerpiece of economic relations over the last decade. Seemingly out of nowhere, fa... READ MORE

This report focuses on how projects to build trade capacity can be planned and coordinated to maximize the benefits of new trade agreements, both for the United States... READ MORE

Using econometric methods this article analyzes how the TPP will effect 18 production sectors in 24 countries over a 15 year time horizon.

This report is an empirical review of ISDS, based on the record of disputes under existing investment treaties.

This piece looks at the time lag between FTA negotiations and implementation, focusing on United States Free Trade Agreements.

This paper suggests that ASEAN needs an ambitious plan for economic integration beyond the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), to achieve its economic development aspirati... READ MORE

This paper argues that the formation of regional integration frameworks can be best understood as a dominant state’s attempt to create a preferred regional frame... READ MORE

This paper analyses the work done by the ASEAN community and its role in facilitating economic development. Despite its success, ASEAN has not progressed very far in t... READ MORE

An increasingly important part of international trade consists of fragmentation of the production process, with differing tasks in the global value chain (GVC) being u... READ MORE

The rise of mega-regionals such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) suggests that the world trade system... READ MORE

This working paper discusses on how to facilitate integration of international supply chain using paperless trade in the Asia-Pacific Region. The paper defines paperle... READ MORE

At the Ninth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) held in Bali on 3–6 December 2013, the ministers agreed upon the WTO Agreement on Trade... READ MORE

This paper analyzes whether the degree of risk-sharing in East Asia has improved along with the observed rise in integration in the region. Higher risk-sharing is expe... READ MORE

Favorable economic growth prospects for the East and Southern Africa region will result in increased trade flows. This puts significant pressure on Tanzania’s po... READ MORE

This column discusses the difficulties involved in consolidating free trade agreements at the regional level, and argues that piecing together the blocs around the wor... READ MORE

This paper attempts to reveal those RTAs upon which the WTO fails to shed the light of the transparency exercise. While many studies have pointed out that there are ma... READ MORE

Participants of the plurilateral talks on liberalising services trade continue to make good progress, officials involved in the process confirmed yesterday, just a yea... READ MORE

The negotiations for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership are about a year old and making only slow progress. This column argues that TTIP is a long-run... READ MORE

Mega-regional negotiations will underwrite global governance on 21st-century trade issues and facilitate the proliferation of global and regional value chains. This co... READ MORE

Most economists cheer the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership that the EU is currently negotiating with the US. This column argues it is a pity that TTIP a... READ MORE

This column discusses the challenges the TTIP is likely to face after the election of a new European Parliament. Key political leaders should engage in the TTIP discus... READ MORE

This paper assesses the potential trade impacts of the expansion of the ASEAN to ASEAN+3 and ASEAN+6 on the Lao People’s Democratic Republic. It finds that bilat... READ MORE

ROK President Park, U.S. President Obama, and Japan Prime Minister Abe participated in their first trilateral summit at the U.S. embassy in The Hague, Netherlands on M... READ MORE

This Policy Brief analyzes the record of NAFTA in order to clear the air so that the benefits and challenges of trade can be examined objectively. In the last 20 years... READ MORE

This paper aims to provide a detailed reading of recent advances in Asian investment rulemaking and a finer appreciation of how rules in Asian IIAs have evolved in res... READ MORE

This report examines the potential for negotiated regulatory convergence in Asian services markets. The results suggest that countries within Asia that are more remote... READ MORE

After joining the WTO in 2001, China has entered into a number of trade agreements. Those currently in consideration are substantially larger than the initial ones. Ch... READ MORE

Trade facilitation, or the improvement of trade regulatory mechanisms to reduce barriers and costs to global business, is a big opportunity for limited international d... READ MORE

This report offers practical recommendations for policymakers, companies, and practitioners on how to reduce each one of these barriers. It also presents three areas t... READ MORE

At its launch in 2001, the Doha Round of trade negotiations was dubbed the round for the “Developing Countries and for the protection of the environment.”... READ MORE

This think piece argues that the traditional approaches to monitor, constrain, and regulate RTAs are antiquated, both because WTO Members are not invested in such appr... READ MORE

In a February 28 letter to U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman, a set of interest groups invited him to join his EU counterparts and “embark upon a thorough... READ MORE

In an op-ed for the New York Times, Paul Krugman calls the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) “No big deal”. This column looks at Krugman’s main argumen... READ MORE

On February 19, U.S. president Barack Obama, Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto, and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper will meet in Toluca, Mexico for th... READ MORE

There has been a lot of talk about Africa’s rising economic prosperity and whether it is sustainable and deeply rooted in reducing extreme poverty across the con... READ MORE

Most observers agree the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement will be tough to conclude because of the high-standard, comprehensive nature of the 12-country... READ MORE

The Policy Brief discusses the possibility of addressing currency manipulation and the subsequent effects on the US dollar and other currencies around the world. The p... READ MORE

The Brisbane Group of 20 (G20) Leaders Summit in November will provide Australia an opportunity to inject new life into a grouping founded to broaden dialogue on inter... READ MORE

The authors writes the U.S. should continue pursuing a more ambitious agenda with Turkey, given Turkey’s importance for U.S. interests and the U.S. goal that Tur... READ MORE

This paper assesses the PRC’s FTA strategy, the potential for regional integration in the South Caucasus, and the likely impacts of an FTA on the economies of Ar... READ MORE

Most observers agree the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement will be tough to conclude because of the high-standard, comprehensive nature of the 12-country... READ MORE

The internationalization of production processes – the so-called global value chain (GVC) revolution – has opened a new pathway to industrial development.... READ MORE

This handbook aims to foster a better understanding of the inter-linkages between international trade, the environment and the green economy. It therefore focuses on n... READ MORE

Global value chains have brought about important changes for the world trading system, not just in the structure and composition of trade but also in their implication... READ MORE

On January 1, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) will celebrate its twentieth anniversary. Today, North America is more deeply interconnected than ever be... READ MORE

Like administrations before it, the Obama administration has put economics at the center of its Asia-Pacific strategy. But it has arguably raised the stakes by making... READ MORE

The multilateral trading system was shaped by plurilateral agreements. Given the size of the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) membership and the diversity of int... READ MORE

Regional trade agreements (RTAs) have proliferated around the globe in the past decades. There has been an intense debate about their implications for the world tradin... READ MORE

This paper addresses in more detail the question raised in Wacker (2011b): why does foreign direct investment (FDI) generally have a positive impact on developing coun... READ MORE

The experience of trade negotiations of the past decade shows that the multilateral system is at an impasse. Not only has it been difficult to get agreement on traditi... READ MORE

If all mega-regional trade and economic integration projects under negotiations are successfully completed, it would see the most important international goods, servic... READ MORE

If all mega-regional trade and economic integration projects under negotiations are successfully completed, it would see the most important international goods, servic... READ MORE

Failure to address these issues will make further significant progress on the Doha Round difficult, notwithstanding a successful outcome in Bali. An important wild car... READ MORE

Next month marks the 20th anniversary of the ratification of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). The world economy looked quite a bit different in 1993 th... READ MORE

The coming decade will see different visions for the future of trade and geopolitics in Asia play out, with Southeast Asia at the center of it all. Beijing’s new... READ MORE

This book analyzes the current state of the region's service sector, the salient barriers to service sector development, and the prospects for the sector to serve... READ MORE

The resort to discrimination in the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region against foreign commercial interests is documented in this paper and compared to aggregat... READ MORE

This study assesses the role of domestic transport costs ("factory-to-port") in shaping the level and diversification of countries' overall and subnation... READ MORE

The purpose of the study is to examine the current state of South Sudan’s trade with its regional trading partners; Sudan, Uganda, Ethiopia, Kenya and to an exte... READ MORE

Cross-Border Investment (CBI) refers to all capital flows, both private and public, between countries i.e. investment across the geographical borders of countries. Int... READ MORE

The carefully titled Agreement between New Zealand and the Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen, and Matsu on Economic Cooperation (ANZTEC), signed on... READ MORE

In July 1996, Russia and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) established a comprehensive ASEAN-Russia Dialogue Partnership. Despite these efforts, neith... READ MORE

The 45th ASEAN Economic Ministers (AEM) Meeting and related meetings will be held in Brunei from August 20 to 24. The AEM provides a platform for economic and trade mi... READ MORE

U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman has been clear that President Obama will seek Trade Promotion Authority (TPA). Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus an... READ MORE

The administration is engaged in negotiations that go far beyond our nation’s vast expanses, Atlantic and Pacific, as well as our northern and southern borders.... READ MORE

With many economies in the industrialized world struggling since the 2008-09 global recession, many countries in the European Union continue to post negative growth ra... READ MORE

Last month, Vice President Joe Biden met with Colombian president Juan Manuel Santos in Bogotá as part of his whirlwind tour of the Americas. During and after t... READ MORE

Have regional trading agreements (RTAs) boosted intra-regional trade in southern Africa? How has the direction and composition of intra-regional trade in southern Afri... READ MORE

There has been much confusion, rather than debate, on the use of free trade agreements (FTAs). Unfortunately, a large part of the confusion is caused by the absence of... READ MORE

The purpose of this Brief is to provide the rationale for transforming Africa’s potential regional transport corridors into economic corridors and to discuss the... READ MORE

The decision to welcome Japan into the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) promises to be transformative, not only for the world’s third-largest economy (see March 2... READ MORE

This report assesses the regulatory framework for trade and investment in five areas - horizontal measures, information and communications technologies, transport serv... READ MORE

Engelken explores the assertion that India and Pakistan must expand their bilateral trade significantly if South Asia is to remain peaceful over the coming 20 years.READ MORE

Although the TPP negotiations have received considerable attention, much of it has been focused on the participation of the United States and the interest of the Asian... READ MORE

Economic corridors connect economic agents along a defined geography. They provide important connections between economic nodes or hubs that are usually centered in ur... READ MORE

Since the first merchant ship of the new American republic set sail from New York for Canton in 1784, trade has been at the heart of U.S. strategy in the Asia-Pacific.... READ MORE

2013 could very well be a big year for Japanese trade policy. Japan is contemplating four major trade negotiations that could finally help its trade policy gain tracti... READ MORE

The fact is, the U.S. and the EU have it in their power to enact a potentially game-changing policy that could boost economic growth on both side of the Atlantic, help... READ MORE

Abe himself seems to have learned from his previous, unhappy experience as prime minister in 2006-07. In his first public remarks after taking back the job in late Dec... READ MORE

The current debate on the European crisis has highlighted the role of fiscal imbalances in explaining the turmoil that has dominated Europe in the past few years. This... READ MORE

Despite being a source of income to about 43 percent of Africa’s population, informal cross border trade (ICBT) is generally regarded as illegal commercializatio... READ MORE

This paper models FTA-utilization costs and estimates the evolution utilization costs for the FTA between the US and Chile. The model identifies costs by exploiting th... READ MORE

This policy brief argues that the United States needs new initiatives that discipline foreign practices, increase access to foreign markets, revitalize the World Trade... READ MORE

Trade and investment in services are difficult to measure, and the regulatory barriers that inhibit the free flow of services are hard to quantify. As a result, very l... READ MORE

This paper studies the potential for the export sector to play a more important role in promoting growth in Central America, Panama, and the Dominican Republic (CAPDR)... READ MORE

African Union Heads of State and Government have adopted and are pursuing regional integration as an overarching continental development strategy. The vision at the co... READ MORE

Washington must make sure that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)-led trade approach avoids weakening or dividing ASEAN. That is vital because the engagement strategy... READ MORE

The U.S.-ASEAN Strategy Commission was organized by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) to provide useful and practical recommendations to Americ... READ MORE

China's 10 years of membership in the WTO has taken place against a backdrop of dynamic change in the world economy. Indeed, China's participation in the WTO a... READ MORE

Examination of the extent of liberalization in regional trade agreements (RTAs) in the Americas in comparison with other regions of the world, to discuss the potential... READ MORE

A major obstacle to advancing the understanding of RTAs is the absence of detailed information about their contents. This limits empirical analysis of their economic e... READ MORE

Rules of origin are a crucial market access instrument in the rapidly proliferating network of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) around the world. In this volume, E... READ MORE

The book explores the impact of transport costs on trade in Latin America and the Caribbean, and argues that transport costs have assumed an unprecedented strategic im... READ MORE

This book is based on a conference entitled "Regional Public Goods and Regional Development Assistance", held in Washington, D.C. on November 6-7, 2002. It e... READ MORE

Regional integration initiatives have long been part of the world economic landscape. In Latin America, integration flourished in the early post-war era but then lost... READ MORE

Ghana is currently facing two major trade policy adjustments - the economic community of West African states (ECOWAS) common external tariff (CET) is a significant mil... READ MORE