Africa's Trade in Services and Economic Partnership Agreements

Africa's Trade in Services and Economic Partnership Agreements PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Electronic book
Languages : en
Pages :

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Africa's Trade in Services and Economic Partnership Agreements

Africa's Trade in Services and Economic Partnership Agreements PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Electronic book
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description


Africa???s Trade in Services and Economic Partnership Agreements

Africa???s Trade in Services and Economic Partnership Agreements PDF Author: Weltbank
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Trade can play a crucial role in the development of services sectors in Africa. Services offer new dynamic opportunities for exports, especially for land-locked countries, while opening up to imports of services and foreign direct investment is a key mechanism to increase competition and drive greater efficiency in the provision of services in the domestic economy. Lower prices, higher quality and wider access to services raises productivity improves competitiveness and is critical for poverty reduction. But trade opening may need to be coordinated with regulatory reforms, to ensure efficient outcomes, while additional policies may be required to ensure that public policy objectives regarding equity are achieved. This places emphasis on the capacity to define and implement sound regulatory policies for services sectors, capacity that is limited in many African countries. Regulatory and trade reforms in Africa need to be supported with technical and financial assistance. Such assistance should be available to all African countries that wish to reform their services sectors, whether they negotiate and sign an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) or not. An independently managed fund for services trade reform in Africa, organized around common priority sectors, that would allocate resources to support implementation of reforms and consultants according to expertise, not nationality, will be the most appropriate vehicle for providing technical assistance and building capacity.

Economic Partnership Agreements and the Export Competitiveness of Africa

Economic Partnership Agreements and the Export Competitiveness of Africa PDF Author: Paul Brenton
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Commercial policy
Languages : en
Pages : 29

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Book Description
Abstract: Trade can be a key driver of growth for African countries, as it has been for those countries, particularly in East Asia, that have experienced high and sustained rates of growth. Economic partnership agreements with the European Union could be instrumental in a competitiveness framework, but to do so they would have to be designed carefully in a way that supports integration into the global economy and is consistent with national development strategies. Interim agreements have focused on reciprocal tariff removal and less restrictive rules of origin. To be fully effective, economic partnership agreements will have to address constraints to regional integration, including both tariff and non-tariff barriers; improve trade facilitation; and define appropriate most favored nation services liberalization. At the same time, African countries will need to reduce external tariff peak barriers on a most favored nation basis to ensure that when preferences for the European Union are implemented after transitional periods, they do not lead to substantial losses from trade diversion. This entails an ambitious agenda of policy reform that must be backed up by development assistance in the form of "aid for trade."

Did you say free trade ?

Did you say free trade ? PDF Author: Berthelot jacques
Publisher: Editions L'Harmattan
ISBN: 214010045X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : fr
Pages : 146

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Book Description
The headlong rush of the European Union (EU) in Free Trade Agreements reaches the paroxysm of absurdity when it imposes them on West Africa, whose per capita GDP is 21 times lower than its own. This Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) would make West Africa lose 76% of its customs revenue on its imports from the EU and lead to a sharp rise in unemployment due to the loss of competitiveness of its companies including the informal sectors.The latter will be worsened by the premature signing, with support from the EU, of the Continental Free Trade Area by 13 of 16 West African States, all this based on a number of untruths from the European Commission, as identified in this book.

International Trade Policy and Class Dynamics in South Africa

International Trade Policy and Class Dynamics in South Africa PDF Author: Simone Claar
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319657143
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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Book Description
This book provides an innovative perspective on class dynamics in South Africa, focusing specifically on how different interests have shaped economic and trade policy. As an emerging market, South African political and economic actions are subject to the attention of international trade policy. Claar provides an in-depth class analysis of the contradictory negotiation processes that occurred between South Africa and the European Union on Economic-Partnership Agreements (EPA), examining the divergent roles played by the political and economic elite, and the working class. The author considers their relationships with the new global trade agenda, as well as their differing standpoints on the EPA.

Modeling Services Liberalization: The Case of Kenya

Modeling Services Liberalization: The Case of Kenya PDF Author: David G. Tarr
Publisher: World Bank Publications
ISBN:
Category : Air
Languages : en
Pages : 46

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Book Description
This paper employs a 55 sector small open economy computable general equilibrium model of the Kenyan economy to assess the impact of the liberalization of regulatory barriers against foreign and domestic business service providers in Kenya. The model incorporates foreign direct investment in business services and productivity effects in imperfectly competitive goods and services markets endogenously, through a Dixit-Stiglitz framework. The ad valorem equivalent of barriers to foreign direct investment have been estimated based on detailed questionnaires completed by specialists in Kenya. We estimate very substantial gains to Kenya from regulatory liberalization in business services, and additional gains from uniform tariffs. The estimated gains increase to 50% of consumption in the long run steady state model, where the impact on the accumulation of capital from an improvement in the productivity of capital is taken into account. Decomposition exercises reveal that the largest gains to Kenya will derive from liberalization of costly regulatory barriers that are non-discriminatory in their impacts between Kenyan and multinational service providers.

Africa

Africa PDF Author: Weltbank
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
This report addresses the question raised in its title - now that 18 interim Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) have been initialed and negotiations of full EPAs have been launched, what should African countries and regional EPA-groups do? Part two of the report analyzes the outcome of the EPA negotiations thus far, the interim EPAs' implications for the trade and related policies of participating African countries, and the reforms required for successful implementation of interim EPAs. Part three examines the potential role of full EPAs, in advancing regional trade integration, open trade policies, and the liberalization of trade in services and foreign direct investment in Africa. The intended audience for this report is primarily policy makers and their advisors in the African EPA-countries, but it may also be of interest to those in the broader development community concerned with Africa.

Negotiating Regions

Negotiating Regions PDF Author: Helmut Asche
Publisher: Leipziger Universitätsverlag
ISBN: 9783865832375
Category : Africa
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description


North-South Regional Trade Agreements as Legal Regimes

North-South Regional Trade Agreements as Legal Regimes PDF Author: Clair Gammage
Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing
ISBN: 1784719625
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 405

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Book Description
This book offers a critical reflection of the North-South regional trade agreements (RTAs), known as the Economic Partnership Agreements, negotiated between the EU and the African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries. Conceiving of regions as legal regimes, Clair Gammage highlights the challenges facing developing countries when negotiating RTAs with developed countries and interrogates the assumption that these agreements will and can promote sustainable development through trade.

The African Continental Free Trade Agreement: Welfare Gains Estimates from a General Equilibrium Model

The African Continental Free Trade Agreement: Welfare Gains Estimates from a General Equilibrium Model PDF Author: Mr.Lisandro Abrego
Publisher: International Monetary Fund
ISBN: 1498314392
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 32

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Book Description
In March 2018, representatives of member countries of the African Union signed the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement. This agreement provides a framework for trade liberalization in goods and services and is expected to eventually cover all African countries. Using a multi-country, multi-sector general equilibrium model based on Costinot and Rodriguez-Clare (2014), we estimate the welfare effects of the AfCFTA for 45 countries in Africa. Three different model specifications—comprising both perfect competition and monopolistic competition—are used. Simulations include full elimination of import tariffs and partial but substantial reduction in non-tariff barriers (NTBs). Results reveal significant potential welfare gains from trade liberalization in Africa. As intra-regional import tariffs in the continent are already low, the bulk of these gains come from lowering NTBs. Overall gains for the continent are broadly similar under the three model specifications used, with considerable variation of potential welfare gains across countries in all model structures.