-
Easter Break
BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest will be taking a break over Easter, so there will be no distribution on 5 April. The next issue will be distributed as usual on 12 April.…
-
Correction and Clarification: UNCED, Blue Box Subsidies and The Peace Clause
In the first story of last week’s BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest, we misnamed UNCED: the UN Conference on Environment and Development was and still is the correct name of this important event, that took place in Rio in 1992. In BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest Vol. 3, No. 8, in the story about CAP reform,…
-
U.S. Turns Up Heat Under Beef Ban Dispute
In a move similar to its actions in the EU-U.S. banana dispute, the U.S. on 22 March issued a preliminary list of EU products that could be hit with 100 percent import duties in retaliation for the EU ban on imports of U.S. beef produced with growth-promoting hormones (See BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest, Vol.…
-
General Council Meets Briefly on Ministerial Preparations
The General Council met in Special Session last week in the context of ongoing preparations for the Third Ministerial Meeting which will take place in Seattle at the end of this year. The Ministerial Declaration towards which WTO Members are currently working in the General Council Special Sessions is important as it will be the…
-
U.S., African Nations Meet on Trade, Economic Development
The Clinton Administration earlier this month met with eighty-three ministers from forty-six sub-Saharan African nations, representatives from four North African nations, and the heads of eight African regional organisations to foster economic development, trade, investment, political reform, and mutual economic growth. At the meeting African ministers expressed strong support for the immediate passage…
-
WTO Membership May be Close for China
As BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest went to press, news reports are speculating that the U.S. and China may be close to reaching agreement on China’s accession to the WTO. U.S. Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky was en route to Beijing 28 March to meet with Chinese negotiators, who in the last month have displayed renewed…
-
WTO Agriculture Committee Meets
The WTO Committee on Agriculture met last week, both in formal and informal sessions. A number of issues were discussed in the informal session on 24-25 March, and positions expressed seem to be explicitly moving towards addressing the forthcoming WTO negotiations on agriculture. For instance, the EU reaffirmed its position that “blue box” subsidies are…
-
EU, Australia and Others Complain Against Japanese Rice Tariff Regime
The EU, Australia, Uruguay and Argentina last week requested consultations with Japan over its plan to implement a rice tariffication scheme next month. Japan’s proposed scheme would replace the current policy for rice imports (implemented as part of its commitments under the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT)) which obliges Japan to import rice…
-
EU Approves EU-S.Africa Trade Pact
The EU on 24 March approved a free trade deal with South Africa. The deal- which took over three years to conclude, is the first between the EU and a developing country and the first EU deal to also include agricultural goods. The EU said the deal “would give an important stimulus to social progress,…
-
EU Leaders Pass Diluted Cap Reform Package
Meeting in Berlin, EU leaders last week reached agreement on the so-called Agenda 2000 package of budget and agricultural subsidy reforms. Reforms to the Common Agricultural Policy fell short of those agreed to earlier this month by EU agricultural ministers. Under the CAP reforms passed last week price supports for grain farmers would be cut…
-
In Brief
The Canadian Parliament last week - responding to calls from NGOs and church groups, voted to establish an international tax on financial transactions as part of measures to control currency speculation. Canada is the first government to formally call for the so-called Tobin Tax, named for Nobel Prize-winning economist James Tobin, and which is intended…
-
WTO In Brief
The field of candidates vying for the top spot at the WTO last week again narrowed as Morocco pulled its candidate- Morocco’s trade ambassador Hassan Abouyoub, out of the running. The two remaining candidates in the race to replace outgoing WTO Director General are Thailand’s Deputy Prime Minister Supachai Panitchpakdi and New Zealand’s Mike Moore,…
-
Events & Resources
• EVENTS For a more complete list of events in coming months, please refer to ICTSD’s web calendar at: http://www.ictsd.org/html/calendar.htm WTO Meetings An updated list of forthcoming WTO meetings is posted at http://www.wto.org/wto/about/meets.htm Please bear in mind that dates and times of WTO meetings are often changed, and that the important informal meetings of different WTO bodies…