News: Opinions
Responding to COVID-19: A key role for ASEAN in the region
By Milton Churche and Michael Mugliston, visiting fellows, Institute for International Trade, University of Adelaide.
A key characteristic of the health and economic crises unleashed by Covid-19 is the very high degree of uncertainty over the course of the disease, the trajectory of the economic downturn and the roadmap for restoring sustained economic growth. Indexes measuring global policy uncertainty are showing unprecedented levels of uncertainty. The World Pandemics Uncertainty Index that measures economic uncertainty associated with pandemics and other disease outbreaks since 1996 is at record highs.
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India’s Trade Policy: Embracing national interests and selective engagement
By Amitendu Palit, Senior Economic and Trade Policy Research Fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies in the National University of Singapore.
Six months have passed since India decided to stay out of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). With the rest of the RCEP members going ahead with the agreement and finalizing its text, India is unlikely to be a part of RCEP in the foreseeable future. This is notwithstanding the hint dropped by India’s external affairs minister Dr. S Jaishankar earlier in the year on India ‘rethinking’ the decision.
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How will changes in U.S. CVD law impact developing countries?
By Jaiwei Fu, IIT Visiting Researcher
On February 10, 2020, the U.S. Trade Representative published an updated version of the "List of Developing and Least Developed Countries under U.S. Countervailing Duty Law" (CVD) in the Federal Register. Twenty countries, including India, Indonesia, South Africa, and Thailand, had their status as developing countries removed.
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COVID-19 and Africa
By Ziyaad Ebrahim, IIT PhD Candidate and Independent Trade and Development Consultant.
Africa is poised to be the next epicentre of the COVID-19 pandemic, according a report by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA). It suggests that in the best-case scenario, the virus would result in 300,000 deaths. At this stage, the mortality rate associated with the virus in the most affected regions is higher amongst the elderly population, whereas 60% of Africa’s population is below the age of 25.
COVID-19 and the ASEAN Summit: Acting on Medical Supplies and Food Security
by Milton Churche and Michael Mugliston, visiting fellows, Institute for International Trade, The University of Adelaide
COVID-19 has presented the world with both a major health and economic crisis. These crises have so far revealed a lack of leadership at the international level, thereby preventing a concerted response in the way that we have often seen in previous crises.
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Emerging from Lockdown: Threats to the international trade system
Richard Pomfret - Professor of Economics & Jean Monnet Chair Economics of European Integration, The University of Adelaide
As COVID-19 curves flatten globally and policymakers’ attention turns to resuming economic activity safely, attention is inevitably focused on domestic matters. What is the trade-off between the economic costs of caution that delays economic revival and the health costs of over-hasty removal of measures that are holding back the spread of the virus?
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Kick-starting international travel, tourism, and trade: A roadmap for the Morrison government
Simon Lacey, Senior Lecturer, Institute for International Trade
We are all looking forward to restarting our economy or getting out from under the doona as Prime Minister Scott Morrison colourfully put it. And we are all hoping for a return to the work lives, social existences, and economic freedoms we enjoyed and thoroughly took for granted before March 2020.
Digital technologies, services and the fourth industrial revolution
Jane Drake-Brockman, Industry Professor, Institute for International Trade, and Christopher Findlay, Emeritus Professor, Institute for International Trade
From 3D printing (3DP) and artificial intelligence (AI), to cloud computing, 5G, and the Internet-of-Things (IoT), digital technologies are prompting radical new business models offered through digital platforms that promise unparalleled productivity gains and global increases in standard-of-living. Adoption of new technologies is also impacting traditional demand and employment patterns in highly disruptive ways and radically altering the nature of consumer and business transactions. The changes underway raise major questions for traditional domestic regulatory settings and for trade, investment, innovation and industry policies for the digital age.
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Back to autarky? How to respond to supply shortages in medical devices during the Corona-crisis
Andreas Freytag – Professor and Chair of Economic Policy, Friedrich Schiller University, Jena.
The ongoing covid-19 crisis has brought to the fore the vulnerability of societies relying on highly efficient global value chains (GVC) and single suppliers for specific goods. During the crisis, which first severely hit China as the central link in many GVCs, most countries have suffered a shortage of both simple and technologically complex medical devices (e.g. face masks and ventilators respectively). Fierce competition for these devices has emerged, leading to global tensions and trade restrictions, but also to a discussion about the organization of supply-chains and the need for national emergency stockpiling of medical devices.
COVID-19: Offering us a glimpse into the future of work, the global economy and technology
Simon Lacey - Senior Lecturer in International Trade, Institute for International Trade
COVID-19 has already exacted a horrific death toll in dozens of countries and is only going to get worse in the coming weeks and months. The same is true of the economic fallout it has caused. Soon political leaders will have to make extremely difficult choices as the trade-offs between saving lives and saving economies become even more stark.
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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