The current negotiations on a transatlantic Free-Trade Agreement between the US and the EU (TTIP) have raised substantial public interest. Several studies have highlighted the positive economic effects of TTIP. A new ÖFSE report shows that these claims are overstated and neglect crucial...

Commodity price volatility remains a crucial development challenge of commodity-dependent countries of the Global South. Drawing on structural development economics' concerns with commodity price volatility and stabilisation, this article calls for the integration of price-setting into the...

Die COVID-19 Pandemie hat zu einem starken Nachfrageanstieg nach Medizinprodukten geführt. Zeitgleich kam es zu Lieferproblemen in internationalen Lieferketten aufgrund von gesundheitspolitischen (z.B. Lockdowns) und wirtschaftspolitischen Maßnahmen (z.B. Ausfuhrkontrollen). Beides zusammen...

The promotion of sustainable value chains is on the rise in the EU, with important implications for textile and apparel (T&A) products. EU T&A supplier countries and firms will increasingly have to adapt to the new EU value chain and market dynamics. Based on a case study of the Egyptian T&A...

This Briefing Paper examines the resilience of the medical product and pharmaceutical global value chains. Based on this assessment, policy recommendations are presented to increase supply security, including measures to improve the resilience of supply chains, and to expand stockpiling. We also...

This policy note argues that the low income of cocoa farmers in the cocoa-chocolate global value chain (GVC) is not only a problem in itself, but also exacerbates social and environmental sustainability issues such as child labor and deforestation. The experience of the last two decades has...

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the fragility of medical product and pharmaceutical global value chains (GVCs). Against this background, debates on various policies to increase the resilience of these supply chains intensified. However, there is currently no consensus on which policies are...

Der vorliegende Report diskutiert die gegenwärtige Struktur der globalen Kakao Wertschöpfungskette (KS-WSK). Er zeigt auf, dass sich die arbeitsintensive Produktion von Kakaobohnen stark auf Côte d'Ivoire und Ghana konzentriert, während die kapitalintensive Verarbeitung der Bohnen sowie die...

Based on a longstanding colonial history of unequal exchange between the Global North and South, cocoa-based products and in particular chocolate nowadays belong to the staples of household consumption in many countries of the Global North, including in the European Union (EU). But only since...