Trade is one of the first casualties of a global economic crisis. We saw this happen during the Great Depression, after the oil shocks of the 1970s, in the early 1980s, and now the first contraction in global trade since 1982. A reformed and robust trade monitoring system should be among the top priorities for world leaders meeting in London in April and beyond. Many argue that the priority for governments should be to ‘fix’ the crisis first; reforming the governance of the global trade (and financial) system could come later. That would indeed be a mistaken strategy and a lost opportunity. It would be mistaken because better trade monitoring could determine the difference between a coordinated response and a deepening crisis. It would be a lost opportunity for reform because the current crisis sharply exposes the deficiencies in trade governance, which if tolerated any longer would only serve to delegitimise a rule-based trade system.
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Tags: developing countries, G20, monitoring, trade, trade policy review, wto
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March 17, 2009 / G20, trade, world bank, wto
The recent food, fuel and financial crises have imposed large external shocks on households and firms in all developing countries. They have prompted questioning of the risks and rewards of globalization and identified areas where the global governance of trade urgently needs improvement. (Here, I broadly define good global trade governance as international cooperation in the form of a set of agreed rules that reduce the negative spillovers of national policies affecting international flows of products and production factors.) At the same time, the financial crisis has revealed the robustness and importance of the trading system. A major feature of the current crisis is the dog that did not bark: that is, to date, we have not seen the widespread imposition of the types of trade protection that characterized the 1970s and early 1980s, not to mention the 1930s.
Tags: developing countries, G20, trade, wto
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March 17, 2009 / financial crisis, G20, imf, trade, world bank, wto
Development should be the centerpiece of reforming the global economic architecture. Pressing to conclude a World Trade Organization (WTO) deal to close the Doha Round based on the current proposals circulating in Geneva would be counter productive. Instead, we offer five policies for reforming global trade that will enable economic development and stimulate the global demand needed for a global recovery.
Tags: developing countries, G-20, trade, wto
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March 17, 2009 / aid, financial crisis, G20, trade, wto
The establishment of the Bretton Woods institutions in 1948 was intended to forestall the sort of crisis that had afflicted global economic and political governance structures in the preceding periods, and which have a striking semblance to the current world economic recession. The weaknesses of the skewed governance configurations built into the institutions charged with coordinating and managing the aftermath of the pre-1948 catastrophe have spurred copious criticisms, particularly from the developing countries whose interests have frequently been threatened by the ways in which these institutions have implemented their respective mandates. For the rest of the twentieth century and in the advent of the new millennium, the developing world has been preoccupied with resisting the current and potential impacts of global economic power relations biased against their sustainable development interests. If not immediately restructured, the status quo could have pervasive, damaging consequences for both the developed countries that now exercise economic and technological supremacy, and the weak, almost totally helpless, developing countries. Only a few developing countries have managed to escape the harsh effects of such distorted power relations.
Tags: developing countries, financial crisis, G-20, wto
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March 17, 2009 / aid, financial crisis, G20, trade, wto
The London G20 Summit is an opportunity to tackle urgent issues related to the impact of the global crisis on international trade and the multilateral trade system. On the trade front, the Summit should show that G20 countries are prepared to avoid protectionist measures and practices, and that they will continue working together to strengthen the WTO system. But at the same time, it is important for G20 participants at the Summit to recognize that effective cooperation on trade-related issues can only be achieved through the collective capacity and mobilization of as many countries as possible. As is true for the EU members of the G20, it should be assumed that other participating emerging countries are, at least to some degree, expressing points of view that stem from consultations with non-participating developing countries from the same region. This would contribute to the international legitimacy of the G20 and strengthen its capacity to impact global realities.
Tags: developing countries, G-20, trade governance, wto
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March 17, 2009 / aid, climate change, financial crisis, G20, imf, trade, world bank, wto
When the latest efforts to close the Doha Round ended abruptly in December 2008, entrenched negotiating positions were a factor; but underlying systemic issues, ignored in many accounts of the stop-and-start history of the Round since 2001, were of greater significance: these include countries trading more but earning less; the dangers of premature deindustrialization; a growing technological divide and diminishing policy space. While addressing these systematic challenges will be key to the future stability of the multilateral trading system, the immediate threat to international trade comes from a deeply dysfunctional system of unregulated finance. Fixing that should be the urgent priority of the international community.
Tags: developing countries, G-20, governance, trade
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March 17, 2009 / climate change, financial crisis, G20, imf, trade, world bank, wto
The most critical challenge for global economic governance is to find effective and fair ways of mitigating and adapting to climate change whilst at the same time reducing global income inequalities and realizing the development aspirations and unrealized human potential of millions of people in developing countries. Recent evidence, for example on sea level rise and the shrinking summer ice in the Arctic Ocean, suggests that climate change is occurring even faster than models pronounced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have predicted. Biophysical feedback mechanisms, too often omitted from climate models, are likely to be a key factor in the underestimation and are likely to make climate change irreversible once critical atmospheric temperatures are passed. How fast we act will affect both the magnitude and reversibility of climate change. Some say 2015 will be too late; but even if they are wrong, the climate issue will certainly be at the top of the public agenda by then.
Tags: climate change, developing countries, financial crisis, G20, governance, trade
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March 9, 2009 / aid, financial crisis, G20, trade, wto
Since the Millennium Development Goals were agreed in 2000, many developing countries have made great strides. The world was on track to achieve at least the first Millennium Goal of halving the number of extreme poor, and it was coming close to reaching several other objectives as well. But the present crisis is wiping out that hard fought progress. Poor countries’ access to credit has been reduced, resulting in slower investment and growth; already pitiful overseas development assistance (ODA) levels are falling; and Africa might be robbed of its one chance in a generation to make real progress. In the meantime, the world lacks an effective system of global governance. The three deficits in the system I elaborate below have hampered the structure in the past, but they are especially crippling in the present situation.
Tags: developing countries, G20, mdgs, trade
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January 4, 2009 / financial crisis, imf, trade, world bank, wto
When the WTO starts its work for 2009 this week, three items must be at the top of the agenda: debating the selection and mandate of the agency’s Director-General (Pascal Lamy’s current four-year term will expire this August); setting a date for a full Ministerial Conference this year in Geneva; and forging a forward-looking agenda for that meeting.
Tags: Deere, developing countries, Director General, Doha Round, financial crisis, Lamy, leadership, sustainable development, trade, wto
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December 7, 2008 / climate change, publications, trade
Would revising the ‘Make Poverty History’ slogan to ‘Make Poverty Slightly Less’ reduce public cynicism about development aid? At a recent London conference (28 November, 2008) on ‘Giving for Development’, held at Cass Business School, City University, it was argued that the current development narrative is too ambitious. Qualitative research presented at the conference showed many Britons believe the government’s development efforts are largely driven by celebrity activists like Bono and Bob Geldof. Thus, it was suggested that a more modest development narrative could assist in lowering public expectations about what the government is able to achieve with regards to poverty alleviation in Third World countries.
Tags: developing countries, global cooperation, multi-polar world, national security, poverty, public opinion
