World trade is expected to lose momentum in the second half of 2022 and remain subdued in 2023 as multiple shocks weigh on the global economy. WTO economists now predict global merchandise trade volumes will grow by 3.5% in 2022—slightly better than the 3.0% forecast in April. For 2023, however, they foresee a 1.0% increase—down […]
Neither the breakdown of multilateralism nor the rise of the digital economy has made international trade and its central governing body any less important. An open, transparent, rules-based trading system remains crucial for driving economic development and addressing global problems like climate change. Read More Here
Rather than judge China’s WTO entry in the categorical terms of success or failure, a more productive way forward would be to understand the ways in which WTO membership did lead to positive change within China—and when and why that positive change started to slow and then reverse. Joining the WTO had a stronger liberalizing […]
Trump’s administration at least woke us up to the reality that the Chinese government gives up nothing without a fight. After more than a century of foreign encroachment and bad faith dealings by the Western powers, no one should begrudge Beijing’s instinct to drive a hard bargain. But the bargain was too far in China’s […]
Beijing is likely to favour an African candidate for the top job at the World Trade Organisation(WTO) as US-China trade tensions drive the body into dysfunction, according to an adviser to the Chinese government and observers. Of the eight nominees vying to replace Brazil’s Roberto Azevedo, who is stepping down as WTO director general a […]
China has always said it is not seeking to overthrow the global order. We should listen. Why would China go to the trouble of capsizing the global order when it can simply take it over, whole and intact? … Far from opening up a new battleground, China’s plan is to fight on familiar territory. Its […]
So, the sooner the advanced Western economies that laid the original rules for the WTO get off their pompous high horses, the better. The sooner they recognise that China’s practices do not constitute a unique and existential challenge, but rather raise important 21st-century questions about how original trade rules need to be updated, the better. […]
In November 1999, the United States and China signed a trade pact that paved the way to China’s entry into the World Trade Organization. To secure U.S. support for its WTO accession, China agreed to open its markets and cut tariffs an average of 23 percent. Some twenty years later today, the United States and […]
Because the World Trade Organization tends to operate beneath the surface of the global rules-based trading system, it is easy for people to forget the indispensable role that it plays. But now that the Trump administration is waging a quiet war on the institution, the international community must stop taking it for granted. Read Here […]
Over the past five decades or so, Asia’s economies have relied largely on an export-oriented development model to support rapid economic transformation and growth. But with US President Donald Trump fulfilling his promise to adopt a more protectionist approach to trade — an effort that could spur retaliatory measures by other countries — that model is […]
looking beyond borders 