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Vietnam: economic outlook and role as ASEAN chair in 2020

ASEAN chair

Milton Churche and Michael Mugliston, visiting fellows at the Institute for International Trade at the University of Adelaide in South Australia
Vietnam serves as ASEAN Chair in 2020, granting authority to shape the group’s priorities for the year ahead. Building on Vietnam’s recent successes in trade negotiations the country can use its Chair to enhance ASEAN’s role supporting a rules-based international trading order.

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Industrial subsidies, state-owned enterprises and market distortions: Problems, proposals and a path forward

PBO5 Industrial Subsidies

Weinian Hu - Research Fellow at Centre for European Policy Studies, Belgium.
Industrial subsidisation is an area identified for WTO rule-strengthening by the European Union (EU) and the Trilateral Trade Ministerial Cooperation (hereafter Trilateral Cooperation). The aim is to curb certain trade practices spearheaded by China’s state-owned enterprises (SOEs), which allegedly engender over-capacity, distort markets and undermine the effectiveness of the WTO Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (ASCM). The obligations of transparency and notification prescribed by the ASCM require strengthening, too.

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Failure of strategic trade diplomacy

Failure of strategic trade diplomacy

Naoise McDonagh - Lecturer, Institute for International Trade, University of Adelaide
In June 2019 a free trade agreement (FTA) two decades in the making was struck between the EU and the South American customs union Mercosur (currently comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay). 

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Study tour - strategy of Australia & EU Integration III

OECD - Paris

A group of University of Adelaide students are currently on a two-week study tour as part of their course on Australia-EU relations, being led by Prof Richard Pomfret.

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China’s Perspectives on WTO Reform

China WTO

Professor Xiankun LU - China Institute for WTO Studies, University of International Business and Economics
China has tabled two formal documents on World Trade Organization (WTO) reform, these being the Position Paper on WTO Reform of November 2018 and the Proposal of China on WTO Reform of May 2019. Four aspects are highlighted in this article.

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EU - Looking for the Origins

RPomfret EU Canberra

On 19 November Richard Pomfret participated in the event Looking for the Origins at the Italian Ambassador’s Residence in Canberra.  In conjunction with the geographical indications topic in the currently under negotiation Australia-EU trade agreement, the event featured participants from the scientific, police enforcement and diplomatic communities.

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Fellow of the Center for Social and Economic Research (CASE)

Richard Pomfret has been appointed an external Fellow of the Center for Social and Economic Research (CASE) in Warsaw for 2019-21 
CASE has been ranked the number one think tank in Central and Eastern Europe, according to the Global Think Tank Report of the University of Pennsylvania   (April 2019, p. 94).

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What future for the global trading system amid trade, technological and geopolitical confrontations?

PB AGonzalez

By Anabel Gonzalez - Independent consultant on Trade and Investment. 
With trade conflicts, new technologies and geopolitical competition reshaping the global economy, the trade and investment policy landscape is rapidly changing. While different scenarios are playing out, managed trade is gaining traction, rules are increasingly fragmented in competing spheres of influence and global trade governance is weakening. The World Trade Organization (WTO) is under strain and the business environment is more uncertain, volatile and increasingly power-driven than before. 

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World In a Box - 50 years of containerization in Australia

World In a Box Video Launch 1

On 22 October IIT staff and students participated in the launch of World in a Box by Minister for Trade Tourism and Investment, Senator The Hon Simon Birmingham at the University of Adelaide. 

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Launch - World in a Box -Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

World In a Box Video Launch 2

On 22 October IIT staff and students and Centre of Excellence Director Richard Pomfret participated in the launch of World in a Box by by Minister for Trade Tourism and Investment, Senator The Hon Simon Birmingham at the University of Adelaide.  The short film commissioned by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade celebrates the 50th anniversary of the first international container ship in Australian ports.  The Minister was welcomed by Executive Dean of the Faculty of Professions, Professor John Williams.  The audience contained DFAT officials and representatives from Australian ports and exporters as well as from Maersk, the world’s largest container shipping line.

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