A dynamic factor model is applied to a large panel dataset of Singapores macroeconomic variables and global economic indicators with the initial objective of analyzing business cycles in a small open economy. The empirical results suggest that four common factors are present in the quarterly...

In order to assess the symmetry in the nature of structural shocks for a bloc of countries to form a currency union, long-run identifying restrictions to simple bivariate models are often used. This study attempts to assess the reliability of the estimated structural shocks produced from...

The first decade of economic and monetary union in Europe (EMU) has been a huge success. EMU has significantly benefited its member countries and accelerated the European integration process. Imbalances within EMUdifferences in growth, inflation, competitiveness, current account and budget...

This paper discusses the Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralization (CMIM); its origin, development and future outlook. It puts forward a number of proposals to make the liquidity support role of the CMIM more effective. It is further argued that the CMIM can bring about major changes to the...

Developing countries have been characterized as having played an essentially defensive role in the GATT, unwilling to make tariff concessions, and have focused almost exclusively on securing Special and Differential Treatment concessions. These three perspectives have become part of the...

India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) derive from worlds three continents, which together share 20 percent of world population and 10 percent of world surface area and contribute 4 percent of world GDP and 2 percent of world trade. This paper finds that one of the strongest barriers to trade at...

With globalization and advances in information and communication technology (ICT) leading to growing international production sharing, amidst the increasing trend in preferential trading arrangements (PTAs), rules of origin (ROO) has been beset with difficult recurring issues. First and foremost...

Striking a balance between trade facilitation and preventing trade deflection is the single most difficult challenge with regard to the issue of rules of origin (ROO). ASEAN ROO is already considered as among the simplest in the world and still, in practice, results fall short of expectations....

Since the Doha Ministerial, the developing countries have been raising issues related to the indigenous knowledge system (IKS) and access and benefit sharing (ABS) in context of conflict between the CBD and the TRIPs. Though the Doha Development Agenda (Paragraph 19) did acknowledge the need of...

The debate about identification of environmentally sensitive goods (ESGs) is highly complex as discussed in the economic literature. In the context of SAFTA, ESGs assumes significance as the region is significantly dependent on these products for trade. In this paper an attempt has been made to...