Digital networks are an increasingly critical component of global trade. In 2017, the Global Review of Aid for Trade highlighted the importance of accessible and affordable connections for trade connectivity. Drawing extensively on information harvested in the Monitoring and Evaluation exercise...

This study analyses the role of Aid for Trade in reducing trade costs in least developed countries (LDCs). The analysis builds on questionnaires and case stories submitted as part of the Aid-for-Trade monitoring and evaluation exercise for the Fifth Global Review of Aid for Trade. Trade costs...

This paper looks at the extent to which the shift in the lower value added production to countries in the following development "tier" is actually becoming a reality. Several countries in East Asia have been upgrading production patterns and moving up the value chain, this paper looks at how...

Since the recovery from the great financial crisis in 2010, global real trade flows grew much slower than pre-crisis, in both absolute terms (growth rates) and relative terms (relative to GDP, from 2:1 in the great 1990's to 1:1 since 2012) A debate has arisen as to whether this global trade...

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...

Far less attention is given to the even more rapid proliferation of bilateral investment treaties (BITs) and their overlap with obligations assumed by WTO Members under the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). About 60 per cent of world foreign investment stocks are in services and,...

We find robust evidence of a positive and significant relationship between the volumes of traffic and the degree of liberalization of the aviation market. An increase in the degree of liberalization from the 25th percentile to the 75th percentile increases traffic volumes between countries...

This paper weaves several sets of facts into an argument that: 1) today's trade is radically more complex, involving a "trade-investment-service nexus", 2) this 21st century trade demanded deeper disciplines which were supplied by "21st century regionalism" while the WTO was otherwise occupied,...

Since 1990 the number of preferential trade agreements (PTAs) has increased very rapidly. This paper aims to contribute to this literature by presenting a new database on PTAs called Design of Trade Agreements (DESTA). We identified a total of 690 negotiated trade agreements between 1945 and...