Category Archives: Trade Talks

  Senior Staff Writer, Masaru Yamada – Washington D.C. The United States’ agriculture will benefit the most from the Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade agreement, while 70 percent of agricultural exports boosted by the pact will be shipped to Japan, leading to an influx of imports, according to a recent report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The report, compiled by a group of experts in the department’s Economic Research Service, predicts changes in agricultural trade of the TPP’s 12 member nations. It compares a “baseline scenario” – simulation of projections between 2014 and 2025 under trade agreements and tariff reforms already committed to in the region – with a hypothetical TPP … Continue reading →

  Satoko Adachi – Geneva Many countries which support the agreement on trade facilitation under the World Trade Organization should go ahead with its implementation without the consent of the entire membership, a European research institute said in a recently released policy proposal. The European Centre for International Political Economy, an independent trade policy think tank based in Brussels, suggested that the agreement can follow the approach taken for the Information Technology Agreement (ITA), which was originally settled by a relatively few countries but its benefits were later made available to all WTO members under the principle of most-favored-nation treatment. If the idea is adopted, it is likely to draw … Continue reading →