News: Sub-Saharan Africa
Can progress be made multilaterally on agricultural trade?
The WTO has been experiencing deadlock in its negotiating function since the collapse of the Doha Round. This threatens to undermine the legitimacy of the WTO, and drive Members to seek progress outside the organization. The difficulties of agricultural negotiations offer a microcosm for understanding the wider multilateral universe. Against this background, a group of academics, former high-level officials of international institutions and former negotiators have come together to try to inject some new energy and new ideas into the multilateral process in a project called “New Pathways”.
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Industrial Subsidies and their impacts on exports of trading partners: The China Case
WORKING PAPER 03
This paper explores the impact of Chinese subsidy interventions in the upstream sector on the competitiveness of the downstream sector. In particular, the paper investigates the effect of Chinese subsidies on basic metal products on the export competitiveness of downstream sectors in other major trading countries. To explore the impact of base metal subsidies interventions on the downstream sector of a trading partner, we exploit both temporal variation in subsidy interventions and in base-metal consumption by the downstream sector.
Australia in the African Century
Dr Lauren A. Johnston is Research Associate at SOAS China Institute, Visiting Senior Lecturer, Adelaide University Institute of International Trade and Founding Director, New South Economics.
Last month’s inaugural ‘Quad’ – Australia, India, Japan and USA – leaders’ call drew attention to Australia’s Indo-Pacific strategic re-positioning. The “Indo” of that debate has so far focused mainly on ties with Indian Ocean majors - Indonesia and India.
Cold War 2.0: Implications for Middle Powers
Carlos A. Primo Braga is an Adjunct Professor, Fundação Dom Cabral, Brazil.
The commercial and geopolitical conflict between China and the United States is unlikely to abate in the coming years. This brief discusses the contours of recent geopolitical history in order to contextualize the nature of this new “Cold War” between the two superpowers.
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Global Food Systems: Fit for the Future?
Ken Ash is an Independent Consultant, IIT Visiting Fellow, and former OECD Director of Trade and Agriculture.
Well-functioning global food systems matter, to all of us. Global food systems perform well overall, and today provide more safe, nutritious, and affordable food per capita than ever before. At the same time, over 800 million people are undernourished and a higher number are overweight.
TIISA Young Scholars Awards Presentations & Webinar
Trade & Investment in Services Associates (TIISA) was please to host an online presentation and discussion with the recent winners of the Young Scholar Paper Award offering a Paper Award who presented their papers on topics relating to International Trade and Investment in Services.
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What could generate inclusive structural transformation in Africa?
By Dessie Tarko Ambaw, Postdoctoral Researcher, Institute for International Trade
Africa has experienced strong economic growth since the turn of the century, averaging 4.6% per annum. Yet achieving inclusive growth and structural transformation continue to be pressing challenges. Africa is the only continent where the number of poor people is still increasing.
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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.
Africa Trade Policy in Interesting Times
IIT brought together a distinguished panel of experts on various aspects of Africa’s international trade policy and practice to explore these dynamics and what they mean for African trade dynamics and policy. The African international and continental trading environment is currently experiencing a period of rapid change characterised by positive developments.
Africa’s Priorities Amidst The “Trade Wars”
The ’trade wars’ are firmly back in the spotlight. Regions and countries will be variously impacted as tensions and tariffs escalate. In this briefing for the Turkish Policy Quarterly Executive Director Professor Peter Draper analyses how Sub-Saharan Africa might be affected, and what remedial actions African leaders could pursue. For more context on one option, the Continental FTA, see his recent joint article in World Economics (subscription required).
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