Trade monitoring
Introduction
Les prévisions à long terme sont toujours difficiles. On n’aurait probablement pas pu prévoir avec certitude, il y a 20 ans, des phénomènes « révolutionnaires » comme l’explosion des systèmes de communication et de l’interactivité qui façonnent aujourd’hui notre vie quotidienne, des réseaux sociaux à l’externalisation internationale. L’on peut certes s’appuyer dans une large mesure sur des extrapolations des tendances actuelles, pour tenter de prédire l’avenir, mais cela peut aussi aider à faire l’inventaire des événements importants et à identifier les problèmes qui pourraient résulter des changements auxquels nous serons probablement confrontés.
Acknowledgements
The World Trade Report 2011 was prepared under the general direction of the Deputy Director-General Alejandro Jara and supervised by Patrick Low, Director of the Economic Research and Statistics Division. The writing of this year’s report was coordinated by Nadia Rocha and Robert Teh. The principal authors of the Report were Marc Bacchetta, Cosimo Beverelli, John Hancock, Alexander Keck, Gaurav Nayyar, Coleman Nee, Roberta Piermartini, Nadia Rocha, Martin Roy, Michele Ruta, Robert Teh and Alan Yanovich. Other written contributions were provided by Marc Auboin, Manfred Elsig, Trudi Hartzenberg and Roy Santana. Special acknowledgment is owed to Richard Baldwin for his many suggestions and contributions to the report. Trade statistics information was provided by the Statistics Group of the Economic Research and Statistics Division, coordinated by Hubert Escaith, Julia de Verteuil, Andreas Maurer and Jurgen Richtering. Aishah Colautti assisted in the preparation of the graphical input and Paulette Planchette, assisted by Véronique Bernard, prepared the bibliography. Research assistance was provided by Hans Baumgarten, Pavel Chakraborty, Claudia Hofmann, Joelle Latina, Alen Mulabdic, Andreas Lendle, and Gianluca Orefice.
Conclusions
This report has addressed four fundamental issues relating to natural resources trade. The first is how key economic features of natural resources and the manner of their exchange influence patterns of trade for this class of goods. Second, we have examined how far the absence of trade barriers provides an efficient mechanism for ensuring access to natural resources and their long-run sustainability. The third issue concerns the incentives that governments face in setting trade policy in natural resource sectors and the consequences of this incentive structure. Finally, the report has considered how international cooperation affects the management of trade in natural resources, with particular emphasis on the role of the WTO.
Reaching out to parliamentarians
In 2011, for the first time, the annual Parliamentary Conference on the WTO, organized by the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the European Parliament, was held at the WTO. The WTO Secretariat continued the distribution of its regular newsletter to a growing number of parliamentarians. It also organized two regional workshops for parliamentarians in cooperation with regional partners.
Report by the WTO Secretariat
Paraguay has a very open trade and investment regime. Applied MFN tariffs are relatively low (8.5 per cent on average) and there is little recourse to non-tariff measures. The aim of Paraguay’s medium-term trade strategy is to boost the role of international trade as an engine for economic growth and to diversify its export base, which remains focused on a few agricultural products and on a small number of markets. Paraguay is also seeking to enhance the business climate so as to attract larger flows of foreign investment and thus foster economic growth and employment.