This paper analyses the role of services in international trade through the lens of global value chains (GVCs). Services account for more than 70% of world GDP but only for around 20% of world trade in balance of payments terms. In value added terms, accounting for services embodied in exported...

Most international commerce is carried out by multinational firms, which use their foreign affiliates for the majority of their foreign sales. In this paper, I examine the determinants of multinational firms' location and production decisions and the welfare implications of multinational...

Two issues stand out in this conversation. The first concerns the unfinished business of the global fight against the scourge of poverty, which impacts one region more than most: Africa. At the same time, a key pre-requisite for economic performance - affordable and efficient public...

Building on the results of the OECD-WTO Trade in Value-Added TiVA database, the paper analyses the evolution of effective protection in about 50 developed and developing countries from 1995 to 2008. The paper reviews also the role of preferential agreements on effective protection as well as the...

This paper discusses the opportunities and challenges for Southern and Eastern African ACP countries of services negotiations in the context of European Partnership Agreements. The paper provides an overview of existing flows in services from and to Southern and Eastern Africa, an overview that...

This paper reviews a number of initiatives taken by public and private institutions aimed at minimizing the impact of the on-going crisis of the financial sector on its ability to supply trade finance to support trade at affordable rates. In doing so, it draws a few policy lessons. One of them...

In September 2015, Heads of State and Government will gather in New York to agree the post-2015 development agenda. The role that trade will play in this agenda is neither clear, nor agreed. Yet an open, non-discriminatory, rules-based multilateral trading system underpins sustainable...

The paper discusses the efforts deployed by various players, mainly multilateral financial institutions, regional development banks, export credit agencies, to mobilize greater flows of trade finance for developing countries, with a view to help them integrate in world trade. As an institution...

The paper discusses a number of issues related to the treatment of trade credit internationally, a priori (treatment by banking regulators) and a posteriori (treatment by debtors and creditors in the case of default), which are currently of interest to the trade finance community, in particular...

We show that exposure to country specific shocks has a positive and significant impact on GDP volatility. In particular, we find that the degree to which the cycles of different trading partners are correlated is more important in explaining exporters’ GDP volatility than the volatility of...