The WTO has not been able to recover since the collapse of the Doha Round in July 2008. Several ministerial conferences including the Buenos Aires meeting in December 2017 failed to reach agreement. The US Trump Administration launched a campaign to reform the WTO in 2018 and 2019. This book...

COVID-19 has created a trade crisis in Southern Africa, with a dramatic slowdown in cross-border trade. The crisis, which exposed weaknesses and deficiencies in the trade facilitation regimes, presents an opportunity for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to address and contribute...

Regional integration is making steady progress in Africa and a key objective is to improve the prospects for industrialization by expanding the regional market. This paper draws on a combination of trade data analysis and industry case studies to better understand the links and synergies between...

The World Trade Organization (WTO) Doha Round of negotiations has been at an impasse since December 2008. Several academics and opinion makers have argued recently that the Doha Round is 'dead'. This paper discusses the US narrative on the reasons for the impasse in the Doha Round and the way...

Regional integration is making steady progress in Africa and a key objective is to improve the prospects for industrialization by expanding the regional market. This paper draws on a combination of trade data analysis and industry case studies to better understand the links and synergies between...

COVID-19 has created a trade crisis in Southern Africa, with a dramatic slowdown in cross-border trade. The crisis, which exposed weaknesses and deficiencies in the trade facilitation regimes, presents an opportunity for the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to address and contribute...

Developing countries have been characterized as having played an essentially defensive role in the GATT, unwilling to make tariff concessions, and have focused almost exclusively on securing Special and Differential Treatment concessions. These three perspectives have become part of the...