News: Opinions
The G7-Summit delivered more than expected
Andreas Freytag, Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University and Peter Draper, Executive Director of the Institute for International Trade. Over 3 days at this year's G7 summit under the German presidency the heads of government of the United States (USA), Great Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Canada - met in a castle tucked away in the Bavarian Alps. They were joined by the President of the European Commission and, as guests, the heads of government of India, South Africa, Indonesia, Argentina and Senegal. President Zelensky was also present as a virtual guest. Their aim was to constructively address the major challenges facing the world today, not least the war in Ukraine.
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Services: The DNA of e-commerce
Lee Tuthill visiting Fellow, The University of Adelaide, Institute for International Trade. Lee worked at the WTO from 1990 to 2021, where she specialized in GATS, telecommunications/ICT, emerging technologies and digital trade. Just as DNA is the key that unlocks the development and functioning of an organism, a whole host of services contribute to the development of e-commerce and how it functions as an ecosystem.
India-Australia Free Trade Deal Offers Australia First Mover Advantage in the World’s Fastest Growing Economy
Natasha Jha Bhaskar, General Manager of Newland Global Group, a Sydney-based Australian corporate advisory firm specialising in the Australia-India space. AI ECTA is India’s first deal with a developed economy in a decade and only a second trade deal in a span of eleven years. It is indicative of how Australia’s bilateral relationship with India has grown in leaps and bounds recently, particularly since the elevation of ties to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (CSP) in 2020.
All told, Australian sanctions will have almost zero consequences for Russia
Naoise McDonagh, Lecturer in Political Economy at the Institute for International Trade
Will Australia’s sanctions hurt Russia? This article outlines why #Australian sanctions are symbolic only, by discussing the conditions under which sanctions can be effective and explaining why such conditions do not exist in the Australia-Russia economic relationship. Other countries, such as the US, UK and EU, who do have conditions for effective sanctioning power against Russia, must make complex calculations to maximise deterrent power while minimizing as far as possible costs for them.
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The EU’s ‘Chips Act’: A Rent-Seekers Paradise or a Feasible Industrial Policy?
Andreas Freytag, Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena and Visiting Professor with IIT.
Microchip shortages are high on the agenda of governments and businesses feeling the pinch of ongoing supply shortages. Not least for this reason, there is a broad political consensus in Europe that strong support is needed for the European chip industry in order to be independent of Asian manufacturers in the future.
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Foreign Minister Wang Yi Makes a 9th ‘first trip of the year’ to Africa
Dr Lauren A. Johnston is Visiting Senior Lecturer, Adelaide University Institute of International Trade and Founding Director, New South Economics. China continues to prioritize its relations with Africa. As a result, China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, has continued with a longstanding Chinese tradition of making an African country the first foreign visit of the year. This op-ed provides analysis of which countries were visited, and why, as well as how the schedule fits with China’s development strategy in Africa.
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Why Australia fails to understand the EU
Richard Pomfret, Jean Monnet Chair in the Economics of European Integration at the Institute for International Trade, 2017-2020. Professor of Economics Emeritus at the University of Adelaide. Australian political leaders have long held a simplistic and misleading understanding of the European Union, due to over-reliance on reports from London for coverage of EU affairs. This op-ed argues Canberra needs to develop a more diversified and modern understanding of the EU project, and its value to Australia.
Can Germany’s New Coalition Modernize the Country to Meet 21st Century Challenges?
Andreas Freytag, Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena and Visiting Professor with IIT.
Since Wednesday, the traffic light coalition has been in place and the new Chancellor Olaf Scholz has been elected. This will mark the end of a long Merkel era and the beginning of a new era under Social Democratic leadership.
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Back from the Brink! The WTO gets on with Serious Business.
Anthony Patrick Dela Pena Chua is Lead Staffer to both the APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) Philippines and the Philippine Services Coalition.
Jane Drake-Brockman is Founder and Director of the Australian Services Roundtable and a co-convenor of the Asia Pacific Services Coalition.
Some matters are too important and the benefits too great for the global trading community, to let another postponement of the WTO Ministerial Conference get in the way of timely joint action.
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Why Abandoning the WTO E Commerce Moratorium is a Terrible Idea
Jane Drake-Brockman is Industry Professor, Institute for International Trade, Convenor of the JM Network, Trade & Investment in Services Associates (TIISA), Member of the G20 Trade and Investment Research Network (TIRN) and Founder and Director of the Australian Services Roundtable.
Services stakeholders around the world are banding together as never before in a last-ditch effort in the lead up to the 12th WTO Ministerial Session in Geneva on 30 November. Many issues are at stake, but one stands on a pedestal of its own; the WTO moratorium on customs duties on electronic transmissions.
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The views expressed here are the author’s, and do not necessarily represent the views of the Institute for International Trade.
This work is licensed under Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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