This study empirically investigates key restrictions to the internationalisation of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in manufacturing and across different types of services. The study explores the extent to which binding constraints faced by SMEs producing goods may differ from small...

Countries embarking on trade negotiations are not only seeking increased market access, but also, reduced market opacity. This study distils the most progressive practices for promoting regulatory transparency in over one hundred regional trade agreements (RTAs) concluded by OECD and large...

Over the past decade, an increasing number of economies have resorted to regional trade agreements (RTAs) as a means to further the market-opening and rule-making agenda. In this context, this paper addresses the question as to whether and how selected elements of RTAs could be used as...

What influences the adoption of transparency obligations in trade agreements, and what are its effects? This paper uses a new dataset on transparency provisions in over a hundred regional trade agreements (RTAs) to provide empirical evidence of the political economy determinants of international...

This paper presents the services trade restrictiveness indices (STRIs) for financial services. The STRIs are composite indices taking values between zero and one, zero representing an open market and one a market completely closed to foreign services providers. The indices are calculated for 40...

Although global value chains (GVCs) are often considered a defining feature of the current wave of globalisation, little is known about: i) what drives GVC participation; ii) what the benefits associated to growing participation are; or iii) how developing countries engage and benefit from GVCs....

This study examines economic implications of India’s trade and trade policy reforms during the period from 1990 to 2007. It first describes India’s economic growth and the composition and performance of its trade at the product and broad sector level. Next, recent reforms and the current...

This paper discusses the economic impacts of the phase-out of the Multi-Fibre Arrangement (MFA), which was provided for under the 1994 Agreement on Textiles and Clothing (ATC). It presents an overview of the integration process of textile and clothing products into the GATT, takes stock of the...

This paper examines key trade and trade related issues facing South Africa. It describes South Africa‘s re-entry into the global trade architecture and its economic growth in the context of its trade performance, as well as the composition and performance of South African exports at the...

Regional trade agreements (RTAs) present opportunities for controlling technical barriers to trade (TBTs). Using key principles and provisions of the WTO Agreement on TBT as a yardstick for analysis, this paper examines whether and how eight major regional integration agreements within the...