Global commodity markets are affected by a variety of government policies that may expand or lower overall supply and as a result affect world prices for the specific products concerned. Market failures and market structures (market power along the value chain) also affect supply. This paper...

The collapse in trade and contraction of output that occurred during 2008-09 was comparable to, and in many countries more severe than, the Great Depression of 1930, but did not give rise to the rampant protectionism that followed the Great Crash. Theory suggests several hypotheses for why it...

Trade and investment in services are inhibited by a range of policy restrictions, but the best offers so far in the Doha negotiations are on average twice as restrictive as actual policy. They will generate no additional market opening. Regulatory concerns help explain the limited progress. This...

This paper summarizes the major arguments and proposals to reform the modus operandi of the World Trade Organization --including decision-making procedures, negotiating modalities, and dispute settlement. Much has already been done to improve the internal and external transparency of World Trade...

This paper examines how the applied multi-sector computable general equilibrium (CGE) literature has moved into quantication of the impacts of greater market access for services. This includes discussion of multi-sector linkages to the service sector, as well both measuring barriers to trade and...

Since 2005, donors and development agencies have increased the overall value of aid for trade and put in place several mechanisms to channel such aid and to ensure that it targets national priorities. This paper reviews recent trends in the allocation of aid for trade and analyses of its...

The Doha Round must be concluded not because it will produce dramatic liberalization but because it will create greater security of market access. Its conclusion would strengthen, symbolically and substantively, the WTO’s valuable role in restraining protectionism in the current downturn. What...

The authors evaluate the potential benefits of international disciplines on policies toward foreign direct investment for developing countries. They conclude that the case for initiating negotiations on investment policies is weak at present. Negotiating efforts that center on further...

The competitiveness of firms in open economies is increasingly determined by access to low-cost and high-quality producer services - telecommunications, transport and distribution services, financial intermediation, etc. This paper discusses the role of services in economic growth, focusing in...

A new round of World Trade Organization negotiations on agriculture, services, and perhaps other issues is expected in late 1999. To what extent should those negotiations include"new trade agenda"items aimed at ensuring thatdomestic regulatory policies do not discriminate against foreign...