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The countries of the Southeast Europe region have the common objective of joining the European Union (EU). To achieve this goal, these countries have pursued closer integration with the EU and with each other, including signing the Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA). CEFTA aims to fully liberalize trade in the region and work toward greater cooperation in a number of trade-related areas, such as investment, services, public procurement, and intellectual property rights. This paper aims to help policy makers in Southeast Europe assess the impact of the recently introduced trade policy measures, and proposes actions that could complement these measures and help achieve greater regional trade integration. The paper considers intra-regional trade flows and the remaining nontariff barriers to trade, the benefits of allowing free movement of skilled labor in the region, and how adopting the EU's Common External Tariff could prevent trade diversion.

The Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) was concluded among the countries of Southeastern Europe with the aim to promote further trade integration. The agreement states the objective to'expand trade in goods and services and foster investment by means of fair, clear, stable and predictable rules.'While recent literature on trade in the CEFTA region has focused on analyzing trade in goods, the purpose of the paper is to identify the remaining barriers to trade in services among the CEFTA countries. The paper presents: (i) the economic and trade importance of the service sector in CEFTA countries, and (ii) the existing barriers to trade in services between CEFTA countries, with a focus on four sectors: construction, land transport, legal and information technology (ICT) services. The analysis shows that the export of services has a significant share in CEFTA countries. These countries have achieved considerable market openness, mostly in the context of pursuing WTO and EU accession. Nonetheless, obstacles to trade in services remain. Some, such as the movement of professional workers, are of general nature, while others are sector specific.

International trade in 2009 is projected to contract for the first time since 1982. As a result, export diversifi cation has gained new urgency as one way of using exports to recover lost growth momentum. Moreover, diversifi cation is central to reducing income volatility and sustaining high growth rates, which are especially important for countries with large populations living in poverty. In the 1950s, countries became concerned that their dependence on primary products would lead to steady falls in the purchasing power of primary exports and thus slow growth. A major policy objective of developing countries since that time has been to diversify out of primary products into manufactures. Although some nations have been at least partially successful, many low-income countries remain dependent on a narrow range of primary products.'Breaking Into New Markets'argues for a comprehensive view of diversifi cation. It explores new thinking and evidence about export diversifi cation and elaborates on policies for its promotion. These policies span tariffs and taxes, services, and government activities to help fi rms take advantage of global opportunities. The book is a compilation of chapters written as short, policy-focused pieces. Many digest longer, more academic papers in an effort to make the information accessible to a larger policy and nontechnical audience. In that sense, the book is a policy primer on what export diversifi cation can and cannot do for growth and how to make diversifi cation happen.Intelligently designed policies that effi ciently address the obstacles to export growth are critical for overall economic growth and poverty reduction. This book offers insights useful to policy makers and practitioners as they embark on efforts to design new programs of competitiveness in their trade strategies.

Trade is an essential driver for sustained economic growth, and growth is necessary for poverty reduction. In Sub-Saharan Africa, where three-fourths of the poor live in rural areas, spurring growth and generating income and employment opportunities is critical for poverty reduction strategies. Seventy percent of the population lives in rural areas, where livelihoods are largely dependent on the production and export of raw agricultural commodities such as coffee, cocoa, and cotton, whose prices in real terms have been steadily declining over the past decades. The deterioration in the terms of.

The European Union (EU) activities for membership accession, include a series of studies, workshops and seminars, to both facilitate policy and institutional reforms, and disseminate study results, thus improving analytical skills and policy analysis capabilities in countries for EU accession. In cooperation with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Bank provides economic analysis and experience, as part of its coordinated activities. The major objective of the Workshop was to present the results of the studies on regional and international trade policy issues, as it relates to experiences and/or implications with regional trading agreements, specifically, the Central and Eastern European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), in relation to the membership of the ten countries under review. Discussions took place regarding the World Bank support in the rural sector, and, the magnitude of potential benefits was suggested, though dependent on an enlargement based on adequate design and implementation of agricultural policies. Liberalization of agricultural trade was considered, viewing further openings of European markets. Improvement of, and competitiveness in the food and agriculture sector was identified as a priority task, before effectiveness of the Common Agricultural Policy instruments takes place.

Trade reform programs have two main objectives. The first is to help raise economic growth and employment generation by improving resource allocation and economywide efficiency. The second is to help improve the balance of payments by strengthening the competitiveness of the external sector and expanding exports and efficient import substitutes. This paper evaluates developing country experience with trade policy reforms and makes recommendations for improving the design and implementaion of those reforms. It assesses the extent and effectiveness of the reforms under adjustment programs in the 1980s, highlighting practical problems and constraints, both economic and politcal. Broadly speaking, it considers three issues: (1) the potential conflicts between trade policy reforms and macroeconomic stabilization efforts; (2) the supply response to trade policy reforms, in the context of export prospects and domestic and external constraints; and (3) the sequencing, timing and duration of import reforms, their relation to internal reforms, and the associated transitional costs. The paper finds that trade policy reform, when implemented well, has contributed to improved economic performance in developing countries. The paper also finds that well-designed trade policy reforms do not conflict with other priorites except in special cases; usually they enhance growth.

Revised version of a report published by the World Bank in the Policy research working papers trade policy series.

While trade exacerbates climate change, it is also a central part of the solution because it has the potential to enhance mitigation and adaptation. This timely report explores the different ways in which trade and climate change intersect. Trade contributes to the emissions that cause global warming and is itself also affected by climate change through changing comparative advantages. The report also confronts several myths concerning trade and climate change.The Trade and Climate Change Nexus: The Urgency and Opportunities for Developing Countries focuses on the impacts of, and adjustments to, climate change in developing countries and on how future trade opportunities will be affected by both the changing climate and the policy responses to address it. The report discusses how trade can provide the goods and services that drive mitigation and adaptation. It also addresses how climate change creates immense challenges for developing countries, but also new opportunities to promote trade diversification in the transition to a low-carbon world. Suitable trade and environmental policies can offer effective economic incentives to attain both sustainable growth and poverty reduction.

This is a synopsis of the papers, feedback, and discussion from the World Bank's sec conference on the Uruguay Round and the developing economies held January 1995.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 61-70).

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement will create the largest free trade area in the world, measured by the number of countries participating. The pact will connect 1.3 billion people across 55 countries with a combined GDP valued at $3.4 trillion. It has the potential to lift 30 million people out of extreme poverty by 2035. But achieving its full potential will depend on putting in place significant policy reforms and trade facilitation measures.The scope of the agreement is considerable. It will reduce tariffs among member countries and cover policy areas, such as trade facilitation and services, as well as regulatory measures, such as sanitary standards and technical barriers to trade. It will complement existing subregional economic communities and trade agreements by offering a continent-wide regulatory framework and by regulating policy areas--such as investment and intellectual property rights protection--that have not been covered in most subregional agreements.The African Continental Free Trade Area: Economic and Distributional Effects quantifies the long-term implications of the agreement for growth, trade, poverty reduction, and employment. Its analysis goes beyond that in previous studies that have largely focused on tariff and nontariff barriers in goods--by including the effects of services and trade facilitation measures, as well as the distributional impacts on poverty, employment, and wages of female and male workers. It is designed to guide policy makers as they develop and implement the extensive range of reforms needed to realize the substantial rewards that the agreement offers. The analysis shows that full implementation of AfCFTA could boost income by 7 percent, or nearly $450 billion, in 2014 prices and market exchange rates. The agreement would also significantly expand African trade--particularly intraregional trade in manufacturing. In addition, it would increase employment opportunities and wages for unskilled workers and help close the wage gap between men and women.

High levels of trade costs persist in the world trading system, despite recent progress in tariff reduction, trade facilitation, and logistics. At least some of these costs can be attributed to non-tariff measures (NTMs), policies imposed by governments other than ordinary customs duties which have an impact on the price at which exports and imports are traded, the quantities traded, or both. Such costs are particularly worrisome if they have a discriminatory or protectionist effect, or violate countries'international commitments. However, even NTMs designed to carry out domestic regulatory objectives - for example, protection of human, animal or plant health, consumer or workplace safety, or the environment - can have substantial effects on international trade, which should be considered when such policies are developed. This book discusses some of the analytical methods that can be used to accompany the process of policy development for NTMs. It discusses the broad economic rationale for improving the design of NTMs;, illustrates the main forms of quantification of NTMs and their effects, including inventory approaches, price-based approaches, and quantity-based approaches; proposes a new analytical and measurable concept of'regulatory distance'to help guide deep integration efforts at the regional level; provides a discussion of the effects of NTMs on household expenditures, poverty, and firm competitiveness; and shows how empirical analysis of NTMs can be used to inform policy advice. As such, it should provide a valuable addition to the arsenal of tools available for applied analysis of international trade policy.

Factually, the principal finding of this book is that the trade policy reforms introduced by Peru in the 1990s have continued over several changes of president, whereas similar reforms in Argentina have been reversed. In both countries, the reforms included the introduction of new mechanisms for managing trade policy as well as the reduction of restrictions. Throughout the decade beginning in 2000, Peru's liberalization expanded. The new institutions became more robust, and through them pressures for protection were effectively contained. At the same time, Argentine trade policy returned to the high-protection import substitution regime in place before the 1990s reforms. Multiple restrictions have been imposed, mostly through a reversion to informal methods that abjure the governance characteristics that the 1990s reforms introduced. The difference between the two cases cannot be explained by economic parameters such as resource endowments or external shocks. Peru's reforms manifest the buoyant and confident attitude toward the global economy that reform leaders were able to introduce into Peruvian politics. In the words of former president Alan García, there is an eagerness to “climb up on the wave of growth.” In comparison, Argentina's current development strategy sees international trade as detrimental to Argentina's interests unless participation by Argentine buyers and sellers is guided by government intervention. The Peruvian case provides examples of successfully managing the politics of reform and the technical aspects of policy so as to establish transparent and participatory processes that weigh accurately the impact of trade policy on all affected domestic parties. The Argentine case demonstrates that the World Trade Organization legal system is not an effective restraint on a government that wants to revert to an import substitution regime. International cooperation has been useful when it has recognized and influenced domestic sovereignty over economic regulation; however, it is not been useful when approached as a matter of international regulation of national actions.

African exporters suffer from low survival rates on international markets. They fail more often than others, incurring time and again the setup costs involved in starting new relationships. This high churning is a source of waste, uncertainty, and discouragement. However, this trend is not inevitable. The high “infant mortality” of African exports is largely explained by Africa's low-income business environment and, once properly benchmarked, Africa's performance in terms of exporter failure is no outlier. Moreover, African exporters show vigorous entrepreneurship, with high entry rates into new products and markets despite formidable hurdles created by poor infrastructure, landlocked boundaries for some, and limited access to major sea routes for others. African exporters experiment a lot, and they frequently pay the price of failure. What matters for policy is how to ensure that viable ventures survive. Research carried out for this book demonstrates that governments can and should help to reduce the rate of failure of African export ventures through a mixture of improvements in the business environment, as well as well-targeted proactive interventions. The business environment can be made more conducive to sustainable export entrepreneurship through traditional policy prescriptions such as reducing transportation costs, facilitating trade through better technology and workflow in border management, improving the effectiveness of banking regulations to ensure the availability of trade finance, and striving for regulatory simplicity and coherence. In addition, governments can help leverage synergies between exporters. Original research featured in this book shows that African exporters improve each other's chances of survival when a critical mass of them penetrates a given market together. They also benefit from diaspora presence in destination markets. With adequate donor support and private-sector engagement, export-promotion agencies and technical-assistance programs can help leverage those synergies.

This toolkit provides a novel approach and a set of tools that allow policymakers and analysts to identify non-tariff measures (NTMs), assess their trade restrictiveness and impact on prices and welfare, and to strengthen the institutional coordination mechanism, transparency, and regulatory governance on NTMs. It also aims at encouraging economies to increasingly address the NTM agenda from a domestic competitiveness and/or poverty perspective rather than from a mercantilist standpoint of concessions to trading partners. NTMs are policy measures, other than ordinary customs tariffs, that can potentially have an economic effect on international trade in goods, changing quantities traded, or prices or both. While most NTMs are already subject to WTO disciplines, the main challenge is to allow governments to address public policy concerns without unnecessarily hurting trade competitiveness and while preventing disguised protectionism. This toolkit is predicated on the idea that the complexity and diversity of NTMs should be recognized. Problems should be identified at the country level through consultations with the private sector, and technical solutions should be sought through careful analysis and private/public dialogue. The underlying philosophy is similar to what is known as “Regulatory Impact Assessment” (RIA), but applied to the review of existing measures (no ex ante analysis), in response to specific demands from countries struggling with legacies of complicated and penalizing regulations. Dealing with existing measures has the advantage of responding to an immediate need and focusing on measures whose effects are known. The toolkit is organized as follows. Chapter 1 discusses the newly revamped NTM classification and pervasiveness of NTM. Chapter 2 elaborates on the analytics of an NTM review, walking the reader step by step through the key questions. Chapter 3 focuses on the institutional set up and key principles to successfully pursue the streamlining of regulations. Finally, chapters 4 and 5 provide some practical cases of streamlining both at the country and regional levels, and for product specific examples.

This toolkit provides a framework, guidelines, and practical tools for conducting an analysis of a country's trade competitiveness in terms of growth and share performance, diversification, and quality. It aims to facilitate the identification of the main constraints to improved trade competitiveness and the policy responses to overcome these constraints.

The past two decades have seen exciting changes with developing countries emerging as exporters of services. Technological developments now make it easier to trade services across borders. But other avenues are being exploited: tourists visit not just to sightsee but also to be treated and educated, service providers move abroad under innovative new schemes, and some developing countries defy traditional notions by investing abroad in services.'Exporting Services: A Developing Country Perspective'takes a brave approach, combining exploratory econometric analysis with detailed case studies of representative countries: Brazil, Chile, the Arab Republic of Egypt, India, Kenya, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Two questions lead the analysis: How did these developing countries succeed in exporting services? What policy mix was successful and what strategies did not deliver the expected results? The analysis evaluates the role of three sets of factors: First, the fundamentals, which include a country's factor endowments, infrastructure, and institutional quality; second, policies affecting trade, investment, and labor mobility in services; and third, proactive policies in services designed to promote exports or investment. The case studies illustrate the complex nature of reforms and policy making in the service sector as well as the benefits of well-implemented reforms. Although success seems to be explained by a set of conditions that are difficult to replicate, common features can also be identified. Several countries have adopted policies to support exports, especially exports of information technology–related services. This resource will be valuable for policy makers, experts, and academics who are engaged in efforts to reform service and investment policies in their own country.

Trade that straddles borders in Central Asia plays a vital role in the livelihoods of border communities and buttresses prosperity in often poor regions. By strengthening commercial ties, cultural understanding and deepening community relationships, border trade nurtures amicable relations between neighboring countries. This book examines the characteristics of trade intermediated by a network of bazaars in Central Asia and its significance for local economies. It uncovers the dynamic phenomenon of bazaars in propelling trade. Bazaars were invented in central Asia centuries ago; in their modern form, as highly flexible and low cost centers for trade, endowed with modern sophisticated logistics, bazaars provide a channel parallel to that of formal trade. Bazaars play major roles in regional and national chains of production and distribution with national networks strongly integrated and overlapping across Central Asian economies. They are the major agents for border trade, which fights poverty by cheapening products and by creating employment opportunities, especially for women. The book examines the public policy implications of bazaar or non-standard trade and actions that could be taken to foster such trade. A light regulatory touch and a low fiscal burden would help fight poverty. Improvements in the business climate and elimination of harassment of traders by local officials as well as easing conditions for the movement of peoples and vehicles would be hugely beneficial. But this book goes beyond trade. It considers the potential for border community cooperation in a variety of activities, public services, and shared infrastructure, culture that could yield rich dividends and make meaningless borders as separators of human activities. It examines the example of border cooperation in Europe through Euroregios as a model for Central Asia. Finally, the book concludes with a series of recommendations for public authorities intended to deepen border trade and cooperation.

The services sector is key to economic growth, competitiveness, and poverty alleviation. Comprising more than two-thirds of the world economy, services are now commonly traded across borders, helped by technological progress and the increased mobility of persons. In recent years, a number of developing countries have looked at trade in services as a means to both respond to domestic supply shortages and to diversify and boost exports. Any country can tap into the trade potential of services, but not every country can become a services hub across sectors. The opening of the services sector potentially comes with large benefits, but also fears and costs that should not be overlooked. This book provides useful guidelines for the assessment of a country's trade potential, and a roadmap for successful opening and export promotion in select services sectors. It looks at both the effects of increased imports and exports, and provides concrete examples of developing country approaches that have either succeeded or failed to maximize the benefits and minimize the risks of opening. It focuses on sectors that have been rarely analyzed through the trade lens, and/or have a fast growing trade potential for developing countries. These sectors are: accounting, construction, distribution, engineering, environmental, health, information technology, and legal services. This book is designed for non-trade specialists to understand how trade can help improve access to key services in developing countries, and for trade specialists to understand the specific characteristics of each individual sector. It will be a useful tool for governments to design successful trade opening or promotion strategies, and for the private sector and consumers to advocate sound domestic policy reforms accompanying an offensive trade agenda.

The prices of farm products are crucial determinants of the extent of poverty and inequality in the world.The vast majority of the world's poorest households depend to a considerable extent on farming for their incomes, while food represents a large component of the consumption of all poor households. For generations, food prices have been heavily distorted by government policies in high-income and developing countries. Many countries began to reform their agricultural price and trade policies in the 1980s, but government policy intervention is still considerable and still favors farmers in high-income countries at the expense of many farmers in developing countries.What would be the poverty and inequality consequences of the removal of the remaining distortions to agricultural incentives? This question is of great relevance to governments in evaluating ways to engage in multilateral and regional trade negotiations or to improve their own policies unilaterally.'Agricultural Price Distortions, Inequality, and Poverty'analyzes the effects of agricultural and trade policies around the world on national and regional economic welfare, on income inequality among and within countries, and on the level and incidence of poverty in developing countries. The studies include economy-wide analyses of the inequality and poverty effects of own-country policies compared with rest-of-the-world policies for 10 individual developing countries in three continents. This book also includes three chapters that each use a separate global economic model to examine the effects of policies on aggregate poverty and the distribution of poverty across many identified developing countries.This study is motivated by two policy issues: first, the World Trade Organization's struggle to conclude the Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations, in which agricultural policy reform is, again, one of the most contentious topics in the talks and, second, the struggle of the developing countries to achieve their Millennium Development Goals by 2015—notably the alleviation of hunger and poverty—which depends crucially on policies that affect agricultural incentives.

This book fills a large gap in the literature on trade in services. It focuses on the dynamics of trade and investment liberalization in a sector of considerable technical and regulatory complexity—financial services. This volume chronicles the recent experiences of governments in Latin America that have successfully completed financial services negotiations through preferential trade agreements.One of the unique features of this book is the three in-depth country case studies—Chile, Colombia, and Costa Rica—all written by trade experts who led the negotiations of their respective countries in financial services. The authors offer analytical insights into the substantive content of the legal provisions governing financial market opening and the way such provisions have evolved over time and across negotiating settings. The studies describe how each of the three governments organized the conduct of negotiations in the sector, the extent of preparatory work undertaken before and during negotiations, and the negotiating road maps that were put in place to guide negotiators. Additional chapters complement the case studies by examining the evolving architecture of trade and investment disciplines in financial services and how best to prepare for negotiations in this sector.'Financial Services and Preferential Trade Agreements'aims to provide practical lessons for policy makers, trade experts, and negotiators in developing countries who are involved in negotiating trade in financial services in the context of regional trade agreements. Academics and development practitioners interested in trade negotiations will also find the information valuable.

Over the past decade, four major developments in global economic integration have shaped trade policy and the economic performance of countries within the Middle East and North Africa region: the emergence of global supply chains, the growth of trade in services, the rise of China and India as major international trading powers, and regional integration. These developments, along with the labor and natural resource endowments of particular countries (some are resource-poor but labor-abundant, some resource-rich and labor-abundant, and some resource-rich and labor-importing), have influenced export diversification outcomes across the region. Yet these countries may not be taking full advantage of all of the opportunities the four new trends offer to them.'Trade Competitiveness of the Middle East and North Africa: Policies for Export Diversification'examines the region's trade policy agendas and their results by focusing on the countries'response to these four key developments in international trade. As the region recovers from the global financial and economic crises, the book identifies reforms that could allow countries to further strengthen global production networks, benefit more from trade in services, better compete in external markets to face the rise of China and India, and reach the full potential of regional integration. If thoroughly implemented, especially by oil exporters, all of these reforms could help boost growth and job creation in the region.

The multilateral trade system rests on the principle of nondiscrimination. Unilateral trade preferences granted by developed countries can help beneficiary countries but can create tensions between'preferred'developing countries--typically beneficiaries from pre-existing colonial regimes--and other developing countries. There is also concern about the potential erosion of these preferences through trade liberalization in the importing countries, an issue that has been important in the current negotiations under the Doha Development Agenda of the World Trade Organization.'Trade Preference Erosion'provides the information needed to make informed assessments of the benefits of trade preferences for developing countries, the risks associated with the erosion of these benefits, and policy options for dealing with these problems. The authors provide detailed analyses of specific preference programs and undertake cross-country, disaggregated analyses of the impact of preferences at the product level. Understanding the likely impacts of these programs and how those impacts are distributed is a precondition for formulating appropriate policy responses. The authors argue that such responses need to go beyond trade policies and need to include a focus on enhancing the competitiveness and supply-side capacity of developing countries.This book is a useful and informative guide for policy makers, non-governmental organizations, and others who wish to better understand the debate on the magnitude and impact of preference erosion.

The vast majority of the world's poorest households depend on farming for their livelihoods. During the 1960s and 1970s, most developing countries imposed pro-urban and anti-agricultural policies, while many high-income countries restricted agricultural imports and subsidized their farmers. Both sets of policies inhibited economic growth and poverty alleviation in developing countries. Although progress has been made over the past two decades to reduce those policy biases, many trade- and welfare-reducing price distortions remain between agriculture and other sectors and within the agricultural sector of both rich and poor countries.Comprehensive empirical studies of the disarray in world agricultural markets appeared approximately 20 years ago. Since then, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development had provided estimates each year of market distortions in high-income countries, but there have been no comparable estimates for the world's developing countries. This volume is the third in a series (other volumes cover Africa, Europe's transition economices, and Latin America and the Caribbean) that not only fills that void for recent years but extends the estimates in a consistent and comparable way back in time—and provides analytical narratives for scores of countries that shed light on the evolving nature and extent of policy interventions over the past half-century.'Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in Asia'provides an overview of the evolution of distortions to agricultural incentives caused by price and trade policies in the 12 largest economies of East and South Asia. Together these countries constitute more than 95 percent of the region's population, agricultural output, and overall GDP. Sectoral, trade, and exchange rate policies in the region have changed greatly since the 1950s, and there have been substantial reforms since the 1980s, most notably in China and India. Nonetheless, numerous price distortions in this region remain and others have added in recent years. The new empirical indicators in these country studies provide a strong evidence-based foundation for assessing the successes and failures of the past and for evaluating policy options for the years ahead.

The vast majority of the world's poorest households depend on farming for their livelihoods. During the 1960s and 1970s, most developing countries imposed pro-urban and anti-agricultural policies, while many high-income countries restricted agricultural imports and subsidized their farmers. Both sets of policies inhibited economic growth and poverty alleviation in developing countries. Although progress has been made over the past two decades to reduce those policy biases, many trade- and welfare-reducing price distortions remain between agriculture and other sectors and within the agricultural sector of both rich and poor countries.Comprehensive empirical studies of the disarray in world agricultural markets appeared approximately 20 years ago. Since then, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development has provided estimates each year of market distortions in high-income countries, but there have been no comparable estimates for the world's developing countries. This volume is the third in a series (other volumes cover Asia, Europe's transition economies, and Latin America and the Caribbean) that not only fills that void for recent years but extends the estimates in a consistent and comparable way back in time—and provides analytical narratives for scores of countries that shed light on the evolving nature and extent of policy interventions over the past half-century.'Distortions to Agricultural Incentives in Africa'provides an overview of the evolution of distortions to agricultural incentives caused by price and trade policies in the Arab Republic of Egypt plus 20 countries that account for about of 90 percent of Sub-Saharan Africa's population, farm households, agricultural output, and overall GDP. Sectoral, trade, and exchange rate policies in the region have changed greatly since the 1950s, and there have been substantial reforms since the 1980s. Nonetheless, numerous price distortions in this region remain, others have been added in recent years, and there has also been some backsliding, such as in Zimbabwe. The new empirical indicators in these country studies provide a strong evidence-based foundation for assessing the successes and failures of the past and for evaluating policy options for the years ahead.

Transport prices for most African landlocked countries range from 15 to 20 percent of import costs. This is approximately two to three times more than in most developed countries. It is well known that weak infrastructure can account for low trade performance. Thus, it becomes necessary to understand what types of regional transport services operate in landlocked African nations and it is critical to identify the regulation disparities and provision anomalies that hurt infrastructure efficiency, even when the physical infrastructure, such as a road transport corridor, exists.‘Transport Prices and Costs in Africa'analyzes the various reasons for poor transport performance seen widely throughout Africa and provides a compelling case for a number of national and regional reforms that are vital to the effort to address the underlying causes of high transport prices and costs and service unpredictability seen in Africa. The book will greatly help supervisory authorities throughout the region develop and implement a comprehensive transport policy that will facilitate long-term growth.

The main objective of this report is to help policymakers in the Caribbean design an agenda of policy actions to accelerate trade integration and growth and reduce poverty. The report is a joint response from the World Bank and the Organization of American States (OAS) to a demand statement from the member states of CARICOM, formulated by the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery and the CARICOM Secretariat, to strengthen the analytical underpinnings of the linkages between trade, economic growth, and poverty. It aims at centering the Caribbean's next round of trade reforms and its overall agenda around trade on these key thematic areas.The report provides an overview of the economic and trade system context of the Caribbean, under which the new trade environment is operating. It then discusses the opportunities and challenges for the Caribbean associated with the new trade environment. It finally quantifies the gains from global trade integration using a dynamic macroeconomic analysis. The report provides policy priorities to accelerating Caribbean integration into the world economy and to reap the benefits of global competition. Each part of the report focuses on a key question and adds value by providing an in-depth analysis of the issues raised and laying the foundations for policy recommendations described in the last chapter of the report: • Part I (Overview of economic and trade system context): is Caribbean's economic and trade system sound enough to sustain the new era of its global trade relations which is being shaped? • Part II (Focuses on the analysis of the new opportunities and challenges of the new trade environment): what are the opportunities and challenges that the new trade environment offers to the Caribbean?• Part III (Presents an assessment of the impact of the EPA on growth and poverty using two types of macroeconomic models): what are the gains in terms of growth and poverty reduction of the recently negotiated EPA?

The fifth and last volume in the'Distortions to Agricultural Incentives'series focus on distortions to agricultural incentives from a global perspective.During the 1960s and 1970s most developing countries imposed anti-agricultural policies, while many high-income countries restricted agricultural imports and subsidized their farmers. Both sets of policies inhibited economic growth and poverty alleviation in developing countries. Since the 1980s, however, many developing countries began to reverse that policy trend. This book brings together the first-ever comprehensive and consistent set of estimates of the changing extent of those distortions over the past half-century. Those estimates show when each country's reforms began, how rapidly and completely they have progressed, how much of the improved incentives for farmers is due to reform of agricultural as compared with non-agricultural policies, which have ‘overshot'to become agricultural protectionists like many high-income countries, and to what extent an anti-trade bias remains. Also provided are analytical narratives of the evolution of farm versus non-farm policies in each of dozens of countries, covering in aggregate around 90 percent of agricultural output and 95 percent of the world economy. Such a comprehensive coverage exposes also the different degrees to which the key agricultural product markets have been and still are distorted. The book concludes with new estimates of the effects of reforms since the early 1980s and of current policies – agricultural vs industrial – on such things as global goods markets, national economic welfare, and net farm incomes in all the major developing and high-income countries.

China and India's spectacular economic rise over the last two decades has accelerated their trade and investment flows with the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), particularly with the oil-producing countries. And while these flows are still small, China and India's presence in the region is on the rise. This report focuses on the following questions: • what have been evolution and the impact of MENA's trade and investment relations with China and India? • what actions can be taken to maximize the benefits from these relations and to enhance MENA's international integration? The main findings indicate that the region as a whole has benefited from the rise of China and India in terms of better terms of trade, significant increases in oil and gas exports, and cheaper imports. However, producers of industrial goods have been negatively—and in a few cases severely—affected by competition with the two Asian countries in both third and domestic markets. While China and India are investing more in MENA, they are contributing very little to job creation or to the transfer and diffusion of technology. Faster growth in the two Asian countries—and the associated higher demand for energy—will increase revenues from oil and the difficult choices associated with their management. For the labor-abundant, non oil-producing countries, competition with China and India will increase. But the lack of competitive manufacturing industries and services, the insufficient attention given in the past to building technological capabilities and promoting openness and entrepreneurship are constraining their ability to respond to competition. They need to accelerate productivity to tackle unemployment, especially among youth. This may require the broader institutional changes seen in China and India— suggesting the importance of a pragmatic reform agenda that can accelerate productivity, trade, and investment in the region.

Some online versions lack accompanying media packaged with the printed version.

The report provides a preliminary assessment of DR-CAFTA, with particular attention to three key themes: (i) expected trade and non-trade benefits, (ii) actions that Central American countries need to pursue to capitalize optimally on the new opportunities, and (iii) identification of the population groups that may require assistance to adapt to a more competitive environment. The Introductory Chapter reviews the main findings of the report. Chapter II places DR-CAFTA in the historical context of the economic reforms that Central America has been undertaking since the late 1980s. Chapter III p.

Until the 1990s, the main users of safeguards and antidumping laws were Australia, Canada, the European Union, and the United States. Since then, many countries have implemented such laws, leading to a proliferation in antidumping and safeguard activity across the world. This timely book documents the political economy surrounding the implementation of these laws in seven Latin American countries and provides details on the institutions created, implementation of the laws, and subsequent activity. It finds that, in the larger political context, antidumping and safeguards are a necessary quid p.

'This is a critical period for the WTO and for realizing the potential of trade as a driver of growth and poverty reduction. It is time for good intentions to be translated into solid multilateral agreements that promote development, and it is high time that the rich countries tore down their barriers. But trade agreements by themselves cannot guarantee growth and poverty reduction: aid for trade and internal reforms are needed too. On all this, detail matters and trade agreements are complex. This book provides an up-to-date, clear, and thoughtful analysis of these crucial issues. It should b

Providing the most complete and up to date analysis of the range of agricultural issues under negotiation in the multilateral trade negotiations underway in the World Trade Organization (WTO), this title is a valuable resource to policymakers, agricultural private sector, and academics in developing and assessing the negotiating options.

Title from e-book title screen (viewed on July 11, 2005).

Includes bibliographical references and index.