There are essentially two types of plurilateral trade agreements (PAs) among WTO Members, an exclusive and an open variant. While the benefits of the former agreements are shared among participants only, the latter are implemented on an MFN-basis, thus profiting non-signatories as well. The most...

What are the challenges facing negotiators at the World Trade Organisation (WTO)? By the end of this year, Trade Ministers will meet in Nairobi for a WTO Ministerial Meeting and current talks in Geneva centre upon the idea of drafting a work programme that would set the direction for concluding...

Introduction : the subtext of North-South relations -- Who is served by paternalism? -- GATT and the developing world before the Uruguay Round -- Unequal partners in merchandise trade -- An uneven playing field in agricultural negotiations -- Big disparities in services and intellectual property...

Foreword / WTO Director-General Roberto Azevêdo -- Acknowledgements -- Making trade multilateralism work for all : the role of wto accessions / Alexei Kireyev and Chiedu Osakwe -- WTO accessions and the new trade multilateralism -- The WTO and the changing state of the global economy / Alexei...

The new package of trade accords that was concluded at the World Trade Organisation's Bali Ministerial Meeting late last year was a fresh start for the battered international trade body. Yet defeat has been snatched from the jaws of victory. A small number of countries refuses to agree on a...

Barriers to trade in Environmental Goods (EGs) and Environmental Services (ESs) are documented for a large sample of countries and compared with barriers to trade in other goods and other services. Some progress at reduction in barriers has occurred at the national, regional and sectoral levels...

The faltering Doha round has led to a renewed focus on large regional trade agreements. There are two super-RTAs in the making in the Asia-Pacific and one in the Atlantic, all with rather ambitious negotiation targets, and presented as alternate means to reset global trade rules and take the...

At the Davos forum of January 2014, a group of 14 countries pledged to launch negotiations on liberalising trade in "green goods" (also known as `environmental goods'(EGs)), focussing on the elimination of tariffs for an "APEC list" of 54 products. The paper shows that the "Davos group", with an...

At the WTO summit in Bali late last year, trade ministers managed to clear the way for a new trade agreement. This is positive news - and it proves that the WTO system is not dysfunctional. The Bali agreement brings new trading opportunities for developing countries and establishes a new...

The crisis has contributed to a slowdown in global trade volumes, with trade virtually stagnant in the twelve months to July 2013. In this context, fruitful negotiations in the World Trade Organisation's 9th Ministerial Conference in Bali are crucial to sustain the institution's credibility and...

The continued difficulties of the World Trade Organization to achieve further multilateral trade liberalization in the Doha Round negotiations have raised questions about its continued relevance. This paper firstly identifies and assesses the key developments in the Doha Round that have...

This paper looks at the possibilities of a concluding "Bali package" on the issues that are currently engaging the WTO Members. It gives an account of the discussions currently taking place on each of the three areas and makes an assessment whether it is possible for the key countries to arrive...

The World Trade Organization (WTO) is often accused of, at best, not paying enough attention to human rights or, at worst, facilitating and perpetuating human rights abuses. This book weighs these criticisms and examines their validity, incorporating legal arguments as well as some economic and...

This policy brief surveys the state of the multilateral trading system, tracing the gradual decline of the Doha Round negotiations and the emergence of new regional and plurilateral initiatives. It concludes that the model of the negotiations followed in the Round in recent years has been...