CARIBBEAN TRADE & DEVELOPMENT DIGEST – OCTOBER 7 – 13, 2018

Welcome to the Caribbean Trade & Development Digest for the week of October 7-13, 2018! We are happy to bring you the trade and development headlines and analysis from across the Caribbean Region and the world from the past week.

THIS WEEK’S HIGHLIGHTS

Trade issues topped the minds of global economic leaders at the Annual Meetings of the Boards of Governors of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group (WBG) held in Bali, Indonesia last week (October 8-14, 2018).  The communique may be read here. The IPCC Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5ºC, which was released last week, showed that the world was already seeing the consequences of 1ºC  warming and calling for urgent action to limit the effects of global warming. A summary of the report may be viewed here.

Please see further headlines below:

REGIONAL

Guyana seeks export growth in rice, other commodities to Cuba

Demerara Waves: Guyana is moving to increase trade with Cuba to which millions of dollars in goods have been exported, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Friday. Read more 

CARICOM needs three shipping hubs for agriproduce

Demerara Waves: The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) needs three regional shipping hubs and slackening paperwork bottlenecks to improve transportation, even as Barbados’ Prime Minister, Mia Mottley  said producing large amounts of food in Guyana and Suriname would be senseless if the constraint of regional transportation is not removed. Read more 

WTO to impact 20% of (Bahamas) Economy

Bahamas Tribune: The Government will forego $40m in revenue under its first World Trade Organisation (WTO) offer, its chief negotiator suggesting that accession will impact just 20 percent of the economy. Read more 

CARIFORUM DG urges training participants to use what they have learnt in their jobs

CARICOM: Director General of CARIFORUM Mr. Percival Marie has urged participants on a training course that was conducted for implementers of EDF funded projects to utilize the training they have received in their everyday jobs. Read more

St Vincent and the Grenadines on the brink of making medicinal cannabis a legal reality

Caribbean News Now: Since the government of St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) took a step toward the establishment of a modern medical cannabis industry, through the tabling of three draft Bills on September 6, 2018, there has been a flurry of legal activity. Read more 

INTERNATIONAL 

Developing nations wary of WTO reform proposals

Livemint: Several developing countries are concerned over a set of sweeping reforms advocated by the World Trade Organization Secretariat, along with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which seeks to terminate the principle of consensus-based multilateral rule-making for pursuing plurilateral negotiations in new issues, said four people familiar with the development. Read more 

Madagascar launches two safeguard investigations: on pasta and on blankets

WTO: On 8 October 2018, Madagascar notified the WTO’s Committee on Safeguards that it initiated on 20 September 2018 two safeguard investigations: one on pasta and another on blankets. Read more 

Market Access Committee sees considerable increase in activity

WTO: The Committee on Market Access saw a considerable increase inactivity at the meeting held on 10 October. The committee noted the substantial progress made on the updating of WTO members’ schedules, examined a number of notifications on quantitative restrictions (QRs), and considered ten specific trade concerns raised by delegations. Read more 

China Won’t Use Yuan as Tool to Deal with Trade War, Yi Says

Bloomberg: China won’t use its currency as a tool to deal with trade conflicts, central bank Governor Yi Gang said, as a tariff war between the U.S. and the world’s No. 2 economy intensifies. Read more 

BOJ’s Kuroda warns of darkening global prospects as trade tensions weigh

CNBC: Escalating trade tension, emerging market turbulence and huge debt piling up in some countries pose risks to the world economy, Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said on Sunday, his strongest warning to date over a darkening global outlook. Read more 

Indonesia considering “safeguard” tariff on aluminium foil – WTO filing

Reuters: Indonesia is examining the case for an emergency “safeguard” measure to restrict imports of aluminium foil, it said in a regulatory filing published by the World Trade Organization on Friday. Read more

Saving the WTO’s appeals process

CATO: The continued intransigence of the Trump Administration in blackballing the appointment of new judges to the highest tribunal of world trade compels the 163 other countries that are members of the World Trade Organization to unite by resolving their international disputes in a way that cannot be stopped by the United States. Read more

RCEP talks make little headway

Nikkei Asian Review: The 16 members of the proposed Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership trade pact on Saturday made some progress in the area of market access at a ministerial meeting in Singapore. But the ministers said further improvements are needed to reach a deal by the end of the year. Read more

No deal Brexit could result in UK losing free trade agreements with more than 70 non-EU countries 

ITV News: The warning came as the government released the last batch of technical papers outlining scenarios and preparations in the event of a no deal Brexit agreement. Read more 

NAFTA talks forced Canada to pick a side in U.S.-China trade war

CBC (Canada): When the Trudeau government agreed to a revised North American free trade deal, the Americans said Canada also agreed to something else: joining Donald Trump’s trade war on China. Read more 

WTO not equipped to deal with China and its industrial policies: US says

Economic Times: China’s economic system is not compatible with the norms of the WTO, the Trump administration has said, asserting that the international trade body is not equipped to deal with Beijing and its industrial policies. Read more

WTO, six others partner to boost trade finance

Ghanaweb: The global trade regulator World Trade Organisation (WTO) has joined six other international organisations – including the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Africa Export-Import Bank – to work collectively on closing the gaps in global trade finance. Read more

Trudeau’s next trade challenge: free trade at home

Maclean’s: A push to break down trade barriers between provinces is on the official agenda for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the premiers later this fall, and a new poll for Maclean’s shows a solid majority of Canadians wants to see those impediments to the free flow of goods and services inside the country eliminated. Read more

Post-Brexit trade deals unlikely to help UK economy much – OBR

Reuters: Britain’s plan to strike trade deals around the world, a key plank of the government’s strategy for life outside the European Union, is unlikely to help the economy much, the country’s official budget forecaster said on Thursday. Read more

Impasse on WTO dispute judges risks ‘fundamental blow’: Azevedo

France24: A bitter impasse over appointing new judges to the World Trade Organization’s appeals court threatens to deliver a “fundamental blow” to its key role in arbitrating trade disputes, the global body’s chief said Wednesday. Read more

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