World trade is increasingly being dominated by preferential trade agreements that have taken precedence over multilateral trade negotiations. Within Asia and the Pacific an explosion of bilateral deals is taking place that seems likely to produce a tangle of hub-spoke trade blocs centered on...

C. Peter Timmer writes about the causes of high food prices, focusing on staple grains - rice in particular - and edible oils. He shows that although food prices have come down from the spikes of early 2008, they are likely to remain higher than they were in early 2007 for years to come. The...

This paper empirically examines the relative importance of different sources of inflation in developing Asia. In particular, it tests the widely held view that the region's current inflation surge is primarily the result of external price shocks such as oil and food shocks. In addition, this...

The European Union (EU) became the largest single market for clothing imports in 2007, surpassing the United States (US). This paper examines the competitive position of suppliers from developing Asia in the expanded EU clothing market relative to other non-EU suppliers, including those...

"William E. James and Shiela Camingue examine the composition and prospects for growth of net exports of the United States (US) to the world and to developing Asia. They find that much of the apparent shift in export product shares was a result of the worldwide collapse in demand for...

The decline in world trade volume in 2009 was the worst since the Great Depression. The United States (US) spread the global recession as a major source of external demand. US import and export data are examined to understand the repercussions, particularly for developing economies divided into...

this chapter examines rules of origin which is seen as an increasing significant impediment to trade.