Food safety and agricultural health standards have become a mayor challenge for food exports from developing countries in the past few years (Jaffe & Henson, 2005; OECD, 2003; Josling, Roberts & Orden, 2004; Maskus & Wilson, 2001). As tariff rates were negotiated down in the context of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and in regional and bilateral trade agreements, international trade in agro-food products increased substantially and so did concerns over food safety and agricultural health in food importing countries. Several countries, including the U.S, started to pay closer at…
This paper analyses recent trends and future prospects in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), an incomplete customs union of 15 States in the Caribbean that includes most English speaking countries in the region plus Haiti and Suriname. In these small economies, the promotion of exports is of utmost importance, as in the medium term these are the only means to pay for the import of capital goods, intermediate inputs and technology necessary to build up their economic infrastructure. This study reviews first the progress made with reforms to complete the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) …
The study of CzechInvest, the leading and most prestigious investment and business development agency in the Czech Republic, seeks to describe and analyze the principles underlying the promotion of investment, restructuring and innovation in a country that has undergone a fundamental transformation of its economic, social and political operations in the last 18 years. The country is and interesting example for countries facing the challenges of growing openness to globalized markets and the need to restructure their international exchange patterns and institutional arrangements. The report sh…
(11 de marzo de 2010) Delegaciones ministeriales de América Latina y el Caribe y de la Unión Europea se reunirán en el V Foro Ministerial ALC-UE sobre Sociedad de la Información para debatir sobre las necesidades y prioridades de futuras agendas digitales entre ambas regiones. El encuentro tendrá lugar en La Granja de San Ildefonso (Segovia, España), el 14 y 15 de marzo de 2010.
Bajo el lema "Contenidos Digitales para una Sociedad Digital", los delegados de gobierno discutirán cómo adecuar las futuras agendas digitales a las especificidades de cada región, para que así contribuyan a redu…
El presente documento es una contribución del Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo (BID) y de la Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL) a la sexta Reunión Ministerial del Foro del Arco del Pacífico Latinoamericano, a realizarse en octubre de 2010 en Cusco (Perú). De este modo, se da seguimiento a la solicitud que los Ministros de Relaciones Exteriores y de Comercio del Arco plantearan a ambos organismos durante su quinta Reunión Ministerial, efectuada en Puerto Vallarta (México) en noviembre de 2009. En tal ocasión, se les encomendó constituir un comité bipartito para la imp…
En el presente artículo se examinan los principales tipos de medidas restrictivas del comercio adoptadas o anunciadas en el mundo desde la irrupción de la crisis económica en septiembre de 2008 hasta fines de 2009, incluyendo aquellas vinculadas con el combate al cambio climático. A partir de esta revisión se esbozan algunas implicancias para el sistema multilateral de comercio estructurado en torno a la Organización Mundial del Comercio (OMC). Se concluye que el rol de la OMC como foro de liberalización del comercio, entendida en el sentido tradicional de la reducción de barreras arancelaria…
Global antidumping activity peaked in 2001, with 366 petitions initiated world-wide, and rapidly diminished to just 163 cases in 2007. With the onset of the current major world-wide recession some observers feared that antidumping usage would climb dramatically; however while antidumping activity was up by 28% in 2008 (to 208 cases initiated, according to WTO statistics), the rise was not nearly commensurate with the financial distress, and new antidumping initiations for the first three quarters of 2009 -at 154 cases- are on pace to show little change for the full year compared to the previou…
The global economic crisis has put an end to a period of worldwide expansion and halted the integration of Latin America and developing Asia with the international economy. Current and expected economic weakness in the advanced economies has led us to look elsewhere for sources of growth. Emerging economies in Asia and Latin America have increased their contributions to world production, finance, and trade in the past decades. In doing so, the two regions have deepened their economic ties with significant implications for the recovery of their respective economies. In this paper we discuss the…
The papers included in this book can be categorized into four main groups. First, we review the usefulness of CGE models for policymakers and discuss the relevance of this tool for international organizations and governments. The second group consists of five papers that assess trade integration scenarios for Latin American countries, with a particular focus not only on macroeconomic indicators but also on socio-economic and welfare variables. The third group of papers presents applications of CGE models in two new areas: climate change and liberalization of services. The final paper offers a …
This article examines the effects of globalization on the trade unionmovement in developing countries (the South );. It concludes, first, thatglobalization has been asymmetrical: much further-reaching for tradein goods than for capital flows, weak for technology transfer and verylimited in migratory flows. Second, it examines the role and economicrepercussions of labour unions. It finds that, contrary to the orthodoxview, these have little negative impact on employment but do significantlyreduce wage inequalities. In view of the shift in the South since the 1980saway from developmen…
(7 de enero 2010) El Secretario General de la Organización para la Cooperación y el Desarrollo Económico (OCDE), Angel Gurría, ofrecerá la conferencia magistral "El ingreso de Chile a la OCDE: juntos por una economía mundial más limpia, más fuerte y más justa" en la sede de la CEPAL en Santiago, Chile.
La conferencia se realizará el lunes 11 de enero de 2010 a las 17 horas en la sala de conferencias Raúl Prebisch, y estará abierta a la prensa.
Gurría visitará Santiago para la ceremonia de firma del acuerdo de ingreso de Chile a la OCDE, que se realizará esa mañana en el Palacio de La Mon…
AbstractUsing a GTAP CGE model/database, this paper assesses the possible effects of a free trade agreement (FTA); between the MERCOSUR and the European Union (EU);. The study takes into consideration the most important recent free trade agreements signed among the Latin American countries, as well as the latest European Union enlargements. With a 2004+ benchmark base scenario where tariffs were updated by the addition of information on trade agreements just signed by Latin American countries, two different policy simulations are addressed: (i); full liberalization, (ii); liberalization exclu…
The present paper addresses the Alberta oilfield experience and draws up a set of principles for strategic public-private alliances for innovation and export development considered useful for the Latin American countries. According to the authors the lessons to extract are not reduced to countries with abundant hydrocarbon resources, and may be also useful to broader applications as the development of innovation in resource based industries, the construction of strategic public-private alliances and consensus building, the royalty regime, the appropriate fiscal policy, securing investments in …
El objetivo del documento Ciencia y tecnología en el Arco del Pacífico Latinoamericano: espacios para innovar y competir es diagnosticar las capacidades de ciencia, tecnología e innovación, y su importancia para la competitividad, de los países que componen el Arco del Pacífico Latinoamericano (Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, México, Nicaragua, Panamá y Perú) —denominado como países del Arco en lo restante de este documento—, y la región de Asia-Pacífico, identificando espacios de cooperación internacional de transferencia tecnológica y de co…
En comparación con el período 2003-2007, que fue el más favorable de la economía mundial y regional en 40 años, el futuro presenta mayores desafíos. A principios de la próxima década, tanto la economía como el comercio internacional serán menos dinámicos, habrá mayores tensiones competitivas y presiones proteccionistas, así como más dificultades de acceso al financiamiento. El contexto global posterior a la crisis estará marcado por la desaceleración del crecimiento, las elevadas tasas de desempleo en las economías industrializadas y la necesidad de restaurar la sostenibilidad de las cuentas p…
Given the risks the world economy is still facing and the ascendancy of Brazil and India as major growth poles of the global economy, government authorities in Latin America and the Caribbean should redouble their efforts to identify and capitalize upon the potential complementarities created by greater integration with the BRICs. In view of the inter-industrial nature of trade between India and Latin America including Brazil, the region should seek to create partnerships between its firms and successful Indian companies, in order to gain access to supply chains that produce more complex, tech…
Singapore has been touted as a success story in the development literature.1 Various theories (Haggard and Kaufman, eds., 1992)2 have been offered to explain how and why the city-state has succeeded, but none of them has received unanimous approval. There is no debate on the success itself, what is at issue is how that success came about and how it has been sustained. For many it is a combination of the right policies and timing; for some, exploitation of a strategic position in the region; and for even others, a one-party dominant political system that allows for consistency in decision-maki…
This article, which forms part of a comprehensive research projecton measuring the level of competitiveness, sets out a proposal fordeveloping an index to measure the competitiveness of the regions of acountry. The aim is to develop a new approach to competitiveness, bymeasuring how resources and capacities are managed in a given regionof a country, to generate a sustained increase in business productivity andthe well-being of its population. The following pillars of the competitivenessof regions are identified: (i); government and institutions; (ii); economicdevelopment; (iii); productive inf…