A warm welcome to the Faculty of Economics of the Ramkhamhaeng University ​which joined ARTNeT as an institutional member. The Faculty of Economics of the Ramkhamhaeng University aims to academically strengthen and broaden research in the multidisciplinary area using the vibrant knowledge of economics. There are nine faculty members whose research and interests are in the area of International Economics, focusing on the impact of trade liberalization and free trade agreements, tariff and non-tariff barriers, models on international trade, and the relative competitiveness, with a number of others having International Economics as a secondary field. The focal contact for ARTNeT would be Mr. Wannaphong Durongkaveroj.

A warm welcome to the Statistic Society for Foreign Economic Relations and Trade of Shenzhen ​(SSFET​) which became institutional member of ARTNeT. Founded in December 1994, SSFET was is a subordinate department of Economy, Trade and Information Commission of Shenzhen Municipality. Since July 2013, SSFET has resumed operation which is centered on building a bridge between government and enterprises, by undertaking governmental consignments, advocating policies for the government, tutoring the enterprises on declaring and carrying out their research work, providing advice to the government, statistics work, and monitoring the operation and development of different industries. The focal contact for ARTNeT would be Ms. Tianlu Sun (Lucy). 

The Trade, Investment and Innovation Division (TIID) of the ESCAP would like to request your kind participation in this survey. The purpose of the survey is to gauge the global perception on leveraging trade as a means of implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in the new global environment. The results of the survey will be reflected in future publications of the ESCAP, including background papers prepared for the Asia-Pacific Forum on Sustainable Development and the 73rd Commission
session.

The link to the survey is available below here. The deadline for completing the survey is 15 February 2017.

We would greatly appreciate if you could kindly spare few minutes to complete the survey as well as share it within your network. Any questions on the survey can be addressed to escap-tid@un.org

The training course on “Environmental Goods and Services Trade Negotiations” is being organized by ARTNeT in collaboration with the International Institute for Trade and Development (ITD) and the Ministry of Commerce of Thailand. The participants will include officials and stakeholders from Thailand, Cambodia, Lao People's Democratic Republic, Myanmar, Viet Nam, Nepal, Bhutan and Timor-Leste.

The purpose of the training is to increase participants' awareness of various factors involved in trade of environmental goods and services. Attention is given to aspects of approaches to liberalization of trade in environmental goods and services, keeping in mind the needs of developing countries and their aspirations toward sustainable development. Resource persons will include experts from WTO, ESCAP and also ARTNeT partners. 

For more information and inquiry please contact: artnetontrade@un.org

The ARTNeT member, Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS) and ARTNeT will be organsing a seminar on the topic of "Asia-Pacific trade and investment report 2016: Main findings and implications for the region" on 14:30-16:00, 16 February 2017 in RIS, India Habitat Center, Lodhi Road, New Delhi, India.

The speaker, Dr. Susan Stone, Director of Trade, Investment and Innovation Division of ESCAP, will be sharing the main findings of the APTIR 2016 and its implications for the region. You can access the full APTIR and the 2 page subregion/country briefs with the link here.

For inquiry of the seminar please contact artnetontrade@un.org

The ARTNeT and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ, Germany) organised the workshop on “Practical tools for impact assessment of trade liberalization and free trade agreement” on 23-27 January 2017, Bangkok. The workshop provided participants with practical knowledge and skills in applying quantitative tools for impact assessment of trade liberalization and FTA, as well as an appreciation in the use of data and research evidence in trade policymaking and analysis.

For the workshop presentations please visit here. 

ARTNeT Secretariat extends thanks and appreciation to our advisors. Our advisors are the experts in the fields of trade negotiations, trade in services, investment and competition, trade facilitation, modelling for trade policy analysis, modelling for sustainable development, global value chains, intellectual property rights and trade and labour issues.

You can find our advisors' biographies here.

Trade costs matter, in particular for small island developing countries, such as Pacific island Countries (PICs), given their economic size and remoteness from the world markets. This paper from Jean Bertrand Azapmo examines whether PICs’ performance in cross-border trade costs is informed by the extent of their participation in regional trade agreements (RTAs). The paper begins by analyzing PICs’ membership in five RTAs, focusing on trade facilitation-related provisions committed through those agreements, which have the potential to reduce cross-border trade costs. Applying a New Institutional Economics approach, we can categorize PICs in light of their membership in RTAs; with Tier 1 comprising PICs that are parties to all or four of the five RTAs examined in this paper, followed by Tier 2, and finally Tier 3 with PICs that are parties to less than three RTAs. Next, the paper assesses PICs’ performance in cross-border trade costs using three main indicators (cost, time, and number of documents to export and to import) and data from World Bank Doing Business for 2013-2017. We find that, PICs that are in Tier 1 (except Fiji) do not systematically have lower cross-border trade costs than other PICs. We conclude that whilst RTAs provide a legal framework for improving cross-border trade costs, other factors, such as the nature and scope of trade facilitation-related commitments made by PICs through RTAs and their capacity to implement those commitments, are crucial. Based on these findings, we recommend to review and strengthen trade facilitation-related provisions in existing and future RTAs, to strengthen PICs’ capacity to implement trade facilitation-related measures contained in RTAs, and finally, for PICs to make trade facilitation-related reforms a center element of their national trade policy as well as overall national economic development plan and strategy.

This book analyses the Indian economy after the 1991 reforms. It draws a panoramic picture of the Indian economy by familiarizing the reader with macroeconomic concepts in context of India. It is an interesting read for both an amateur and an expert looking forward to reform the Indian economy. The text is divided into eight chapters, covering eight major economic challenges of India. Each chapter is further divided into subtopics which elucidate concepts in depth regarding each issue. Challenges and problems of the Indian economy are delineated, followed by a policy prescription at the end of each chapter. 

Reviewed by Harsh Parikh, Duke University (student, MS in Economics and Computation). For the full review please visit here. 

The ESCAP in collaboration with ARTNeT has released an online course focusing on Trade and SDGs. The access to the course is free to the public and the content is chosen to provide an accessible learning on the transition from ‪MDGs‬ to SDGs, type process and rationale behind opting for a universal goal, and introduces the main linkages between trade and the SDGs. The three modules now form a basic level course and will be followed by more advanced and tailored courses to respond to capacity building needs in this substantive area.

These three modules can be accessed from:

Module 1 / Module 2 / Module 3

You have to register online and then you are ready to go. This will enable you to receive a certificate after finishing each module.

The business landscape across Southeast Asia presents multinational enterprises with both enormous rewards and challenges. Cross-border value chains require strategic planning and sound risk management practices. To do this, decision-makers must acquire a broad understanding of the economic, institutional and social forces shaping business ecosystems throughout the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC).

A viable “roadmap” for cross-border commercial operations in the AEC must take into account existing value chain trends as well as anticipate the next wave of disruptions.

Conducted by thought leaders, policy makers and influential practitioners, this specially-designed programme organised by NUS and IDRC will foster a deep and integrated appreciation for the dynamics impacting regional and intra-regional investment and trade flows between Southeast Asia, North Asia and the rest of the world. Participants will benefit from a useful tool-kit of ideas and thought-frameworks which will enable effective, efficient value chain analysis and planning.

Women leaders and participants from Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand, Timor-Leste, the Philippines, and Vietnam are encouraged to apply for the discretionary scholarships and grants.

Advised deadline: 25 February 2017. For application details please visit here.

The Fifth Green Growth Knowledge Platform (GGKP) Annual Conference will be hosted by the World Bank on 27-29 November 2017. The scientific committee calls for contributions on any aspect of the infrastructure agenda, particularly for developing countries, with a focus on sustainability, being broadly defined to cover the economic, social, and environmental dimensions. An indicative list of topics that could be addressed by the conference, both at the theoretical and empirical level, includes:

- Innovation in infrastructure delivery, both technological and organizational
- Political economy, governance, and regulatory challenges and opportunities
- Funding and financing challenges
- Impact evaluation of infrastructure at the household,  firm and landscape levels
- Infrastructure, and social policies, including distributional aspects
- Climate change and infrastructure (mitigation and adaptation aspects)
- The role of natural/green infrastructure (nature-based solutions)
- Urban infrastructure and path dependency/lock-in
- Systems effects of infrastructure investments/development

A preliminary version of the paper must be sent, in PDF format, to (sustainableinfra@worldbank.org) by 15 June 2017. Extended abstracts will be considered but preference will be given to completed papers. The scientific committee will take decisions and authors will be informed by 31 July 2017.

Travel funding is available to support a limited number of developing country researchers.

For more details please visit here. 

ADBI offers opportunities for Postdoctoral Scholars (career starters), Visiting Researchers (established scholars), and Visiting Fellows (senior academics) to work at ADBI premises in Tokyo on topics of mutual interest to ADBI and applicants, preferably related to ongoing ADBI projects.

An applicant must have already:

- Obtained a PhD degree in (development) economics
- Published research papers in refereed academic journals
- Developed good and feasible research proposal(s), preferably related to ongoing ADBI projects
- Must be from an ADB member country

For more application details please visit here. 

ESCAP is looking for consultants under the project “Enhancing the contribution of preferential trade agreements to inclusive and equitable trade”. The chosen consultants will review the experience of selected countries in preferential trade liberalization in order to identify relevant issues related to the impact of liberalization through PTAs on inequality. Under the same project, a chosen website developer will redevelop the ARTNeT website into an accessible, informative and secure website for users to access publications, develop networks, and make use of training materials.

Application deadline is 12 February. Please find more details at the links below: 

Consultant on website developement

Consultant on preferential trade liberalization - Viet Nam

Consultant on preferential trade liberalization - Bangladesh

Consultant on preferential trade liberalization - Myanmar

Consultant on preferential trade liberalization - Mongolia

Consultant on preferential trade liberalization - Islamic Republic of Iran

This paper from our partner ADBI outlines the various channels through which women are part of the global trading economy. It focuses on women as consumers, workers, business owners, and informal cross-border traders. Trade theory offers rich implications for the relationship between gender and trade, but depends on patterns of consumption and production that may differ across countries. As an example, we examine the case of agricultural products, a sector in which products are consumed relatively more intensively by women than by men. The evidence shows that tariffs are higher in this sector, which means that women consumers are disadvantaged relative to men. On the other hand, the extension of export opportunities in developing countries in light manufacturing industries, such as apparel, can offer important prospects for women workers; these opportunities are often their entry point into the formal labor market, and provide an independent income that can change household power dynamics in a favorable way. New empirical evidence from developing country firms shows that internationally engaged firms tend to employ a higher proportion of women workers. However, much remains to be done. Discriminatory norms are deeply engrained in all countries, and are reflected in a global gender wage gap. Moreover, women-owned businesses, although active in the international economy, face specific obstacles that make it harder for them to grow and succeed. Although trade has the potential to support genderinclusive growth and development, it will be important to get domestic regulatory settings right, so that a positive cycle can result.

Despite the global volatility and the slowdown in trade, Southeast Asia is expected to grow by 4.6 percent in 2017, which is among the highest growth rates in the world. Asia as a whole is expected to see slower growth of 4 percent in 2017 and 3.5 percent in 2018 as the Chinese economy, which contributes about 45 percent of Asia’s GDP, is expected to grow much more slowly, at 6.2 percent in 2017 and 4.2 percent in 2018. 

For the full report from our partner ERIA please visit here. 

Stagnant global trade, subdued investment, and heightened policy uncertainty marked another difficult year for the world economy. A subdued recovery is expected for 2017, with receding obstacles to activity in commodity exporters and solid domestic demand in commodity importers. Weak investment is weighing on medium-term prospects across many emerging markets and developing economies (EMDEs). Although fiscal stimulus in major economies, if implemented, may boost global growth above expectations, risks to growth forecasts remain tilted to the downside. Important downside risks stem from heightened policy uncertainty in major economies.

Global Economic Prospects is a World Bank Group Flagship Report. On a semiannual basis (January and June), it examines global economic developments and prospects, with a special focus on developing countries. The report includes analysis of topical policy challenges faced by developing countries through in-depth research in the January edition and shorter analytical pieces in the June edition.

ISEAS - Yusof Ishak Institute (ISEAS)

Reviewing Vietnam’s Economic Reforms since the CPV’s Twelfth Congress

 

Korea Institute for Internaional Economic Policy (KIEP)

Does FDI Crowd Out Domestic Firms? Micro-Level Evidence from the Republic of Korea

Two Structural Problems of the Korean Economy since the Asian Financial Crisis

Research and Information System for Developing Countries (RIS)

Indian Economy and Demonetisation: Way Forward

The Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore (ISAS-NUS)

Briefs: 459 : GST Implementation In India: A Solution With Complications

Bilateral Economic Interests of India and China: Rethinking respective roles in an evolving world economy

Policy Research Institute (PRI)

The global trade slowdown: Why it matters for Bangladesh

Centre for WTO Studies (link)

Performance requirements: Prospects for the EDEs

Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER)

Domestic Value addition and Foreign Content: An Analysis of India’s Exports from 1995 to 2011

Dr. Wai Yee Lin is an Assistant Director working at Quality Management Section under Department of Consumer Affairs, Ministry of Commerce, Myanmar. She has been taking part in research and development activities of agricultural export products specifically focusing on safety and quality. In 2010, she was awarded Japanese Government Momukagakushou MEXT scholarship for further study in Hiroshima University, Japan. She received her Master and Ph.D from Hiroshima University in 2013 and 2016 for her research works related to food policy in food sectors - food control, management, inspection, food trade, food safety, import food monitoring, etc. She wrote articles in national journals and international journals and these have been cited by publications of international organizations such as WHO, FAO, ITC, etc. Recently, she was invited by UNECSAP to attend the workshops related to her research works on NTMs in trade.

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The ARTNeT Secretariat welcomes submissions of policy briefs, working papers, book reports, research reports, and book reviews by ARTNeT members, partners and collaborators. For any submission to be considered, the editorial 'Guidelines for Submissions to the ARTNeT Working Papers Series' must be adhered to.

If you are an ARTNeT member, partner or collaborator and would like to publicise your publications, research or events in the next newsletter, please e-mail us at artnetontrade@un.org.