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11. Rules of Origin and the European Union's Preferential Trade Agreements, with Special Reference to the EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreements

Author:
Peter Gibbon
Publication Date:
07-2008
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies
Abstract:
Economic opinion is in the process of re-interpreting low levels of uptake of non-reciprocal preferential trade agreements (PTAs) partly in terms of administrative barriers to preference utilization. Primary amongst these barriers are Rules of Origin. This paper reviews the literature on Rules of Origin as administrative barriers to the utilization of preferences accorded to African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries under the Coutonou Agreement, before going on to ex-amine current revisions of EU PTA Rules of Origin. These are embodied in a new (so-called 'Cotonou+') set of rules for the interim EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) and a second proposed set of rules for the EU's Generalised System of Preference (GSP) arrangements, including Everything But Arms. The Cotonou+ rules include some important concessions by the EU, especially for those ACP countries that do not have Least Developed Country (LDC) status, but are supposed to be re-negotiated within a fixed period in line the new EU GSP rules. However, the new GSP rules as revealed in the EU Draft Regulation of 2007 contain no real concessions for non-LDCs, and they introduce potentially trade-restrictive administrative requirements. These rules are currently (July 2008) under reconsideration by the EU, but it is clear that this exercise does not cover these elements. For this reason, harmonisation of the Cotonou+ and new GSP rules may be a source a serious discord in the negotiation of full EPAs, a process which is supposed to occur during 2008.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Africa and Caribbean

12. The Dominican Republic: Resolving the Banking Crisis and Restoring Growth

Author:
Steve H. Hanke
Publication Date:
07-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
After a decade of rapid economic growth, the Dominican Republic entered a downward spiral in 2003. The economy shrank for the first time since 1990, the inflation rate quadrupled, the Dominican peso collapsed, government debt more than doubled, interest rates soared, and the central bank incurred large losses.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Political Economy
Political Geography:
Latin America and Caribbean

13. Senator Kerry on Corporate Tax Reform: Right Diagnosis, Wrong Prescription

Author:
Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Paul Grieco
Publication Date:
04-2004
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
Senator John Kerry has proposed a major overhaul in corporate taxation, with the goal of persuading multinational companies (MNCs) to employ more workers at home and fewer abroad. Kerry has correctly emphasized that domestic production is often taxed at a higher rate than production abroad, but his prescriptions will not boost US jobs.
Topic:
Development, Globalization, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States, South America, Central America, Caribbean, and North America

14. The Bombardier-Embraer Dispute and its Implications for Western Hemisphere Integration

Author:
Jonathan P. Doh
Publication Date:
12-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
Government subsidies are a pervasive problem for international trade and economic development. Subsidies distort investment decisions, generally squander scarce public resources, skew public expenditures toward unproductive uses, unfairly discriminate against efficient industries and firms, and prompt wasteful overconsumption of some products over others. Despite efforts to limit subsidies through trade and investment policy disciplines, subsidization remains a constant on the global trade policy and international business landscape.
Topic:
Economics, International Trade and Finance, and Treaties and Agreements
Political Geography:
South America, Latin America, Central America, Caribbean, and North America

15. Developed Country Trade Barriers and the Least Developed Countries: The Economic Results of Freeing Trade

Author:
Jon D. Haveman and Howard J. Shatz
Publication Date:
06-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
United Nations University
Abstract:
The Doha Ministerial Declaration emphasized that priority should be given to improving market access for products originating in the Least Developed Countries (LDCs). In this paper, we analyze the importance of this proposition with respect to market access in the Triad economies. We first present a brief history of non-reciprocal preferences granted by the Triad. This covers Generalized System of Preference (GSP) programmes in each, and further preferences granted to African, Caribbean and Pacific countries by the EU and preferences granted to Caribbean Basin, Andean, and African countries by the US. This history is followed by an assessment of trade generated by these preferences in the year 2000, and of the extent to which LDC exports might be expected to increase should the preferences be made comprehensive. Preferences in 2000 are shown to have led to an increase of US$3.5 billion in LDC exports, while a complete duty-free treatment could expand LDC exports by as much as US$7.6 billion, 90 per cent of which will be absorbed by the US. As this represents a doubling of LDC exports to these countries, we interpret these results as an endorsement of this priority in the Doha Round of negotiations.
Topic:
Development, Economics, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Africa, United States, and Caribbean

16. US-Brazil Trade Relations in a New Era

Author:
Jeffrey J. Schott
Publication Date:
08-2003
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
The United States and Brazil are the largest economies in North and South America, respectively. A generation ago, both were relatively closed economies in terms of the proportion of their trade to gross domestic product (GDP), but for sharply different reasons. The US market was highly competitive except for some light manufactures (e.g., textiles, clothing, and footwear) and a few agricultural sectors with high border barriers. By contrast, Brazilian industry was largely uncompetitive and highly subsidized; important commodities like coffee provided the bulk of exports while a large share of the value of most industrial exports was attributable to export subsidies.
Topic:
International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States, Brazil, South America, Latin America, and Caribbean

17. Protecting the Environment While Opening Markets in the Americas

Author:
William Krist
Publication Date:
01-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The North-South Center, University of Miami
Abstract:
Market Access Negotiations are a major element of the efforts to create a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) by 2020. If successful, these negotiations will remove all tariff and nontariff barriers to trade among the 34 participating countries on all nonagricultural products, including forest and mining products, fish, and manufactured goods.
Topic:
Development, Environment, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States, South America, Latin America, Central America, Caribbean, and North America

18. Free Trade, Smart Borders, and Homeland Security: U.S.-Caribbean Cooperation in a New Era of Vulnerability

Author:
Stephen Flynn and Anthony Bryan
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The North-South Center, University of Miami
Abstract:
In the hours following the collapse of the World Trade Center twin towers on September 11, 2001, the United States applied a tourniquet to the transportation arteries that feed its national economy. The first campaign in the war to protect the U.S. homeland turned out to be an embargo on its own economy. Given the uncertainty surrounding the attacks, freezing its transport networks first and asking questions later was probably appropriate. But then came the hard part—how to resume global trade and travel after U.S. citizens' confidence in the security of their nation had been rocked to core? In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the United States, front-line agencies like the U.S. Customs Service, Coast Guard, Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), Department of Agriculture, and Border Patrol were being called upon to open U.S. borders and seaports once again to legitimate trade and travel. At the same time, they were tasked with exercising increased vigilance in detecting and intercepting would-be terrorists or the means of terrorism, including weapons of mass destruction that might be smuggled in a vehicle, train, truck, or maritime container. Just how the United States arrives at the appropriate balance—between openness to facilitate legitimate commerce and exercising sufficient controls to stem transnational threats to public safety and security—is one of the most critical public policy challenges confronting U.S.-Caribbean relations.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
United States and Caribbean

19. Back to the Nest? Europe's Relations with the African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of Countries

Author:
John Ravenhill
Publication Date:
12-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Institute of European Studies
Abstract:
Europe's association with African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) countries was the first of its interregional relationships. In the nearly half century since the signature of the Treaty of Rome, it developed into Europe's most institutionalized and multidimensional interregional relationship. It embraces not only trade and investment issues but also a development "partnership" that includes what has traditionally been the EU's largest single aid program, a joint parliamentary assembly, meetings of organizations representing civil society, and a dialogue on human rights. This chapter examines the factors that have shaped this relationship over the last four decades. The principal focus is on the trade regime, not just for consistency with the other contributions to this volume but also because it is in its trade dimension that the relationship has changed most dramatically over time.
Topic:
International Political Economy and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, Caribbean, and Rome

20. Toward A Sustainable FTAA: Does Latin America Meet The Necessary Financial Preconditions?

Author:
Liliana Rojas-Suarez
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Peterson Institute for International Economics
Abstract:
This paper focuses on identifying preconditions that will ensure the sustainability of a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA). It argues that the macro, micro, and political conditions advanced in the literature to measure a country's ability to compete internationally, while necessary, are not sufficient to ensure the success and permanence of a free trade agreement. Instead, two additional financial conditions are needed. The first is that each partner in the free trade area needs to have sustainable public debts as determined by the achievement of credible and sustainable structural fiscal balances. The second is that exchange rate regimes across trading partners should be compatible in the sense that adverse shocks in one country do not generate a policy dilemma in other partners between abandoning their exchange rate system or the free trade area.
Topic:
Economics and International Trade and Finance
Political Geography:
South America, Latin America, Central America, and Caribbean