Brussels, 03/11/2011 (Agence Europe) - A CEPII study showing the economic benefits of an agreement on liberalising world trade in agricultural and industrial goods and services, through the Doha negotiations at the WTO, would amount to an increase of world exports of $359 billion on an annual basis. Further, if an agreement on sectoral liberalisation of industrial goods (chemicals, machinery and electronics) could be reached, world exports could total $505 billion annually.
In the run-up to the 8th WTO Ministerial Conference, in Geneva in mid-December, which will not, as had been hoped at the start of the year, result in the conclusion of 10 years of laborious multilateral trade negotiations in the Doha Round but only pledge to maintain the commitment to conclude the Round in the near future, the EU, which is playing an active role in talks, is trying to get things moving again, with this handy study on the very tempting possible benefits of an agreement in these times of crisis.
The study, commissioned by the European Commission and conducted by the Centre d'études prospectives et informations internationales (CEPII) on the basis of the July 2008 agreement and the revised texts of April 2011, found that the deal on the table is well balanced, in terms of economic gains, for all players - developing, emerging and developed countries - and would lead to 0.2% of additional economic growth at global level. For the EU, this would mean an extra $30 billion in GDP on an annual basis.
A key plank of multilateral agreement is trade facilitation, which consists of removing obstacles to goods crossing borders - simplification of customs procedures and cutting red tape on transport and trade logistics. This, alone, would increase world exports by $100 billion per year, with developing countries reaping the greatest benefit.
With sectoral agreements on trade liberalisation for chemicals, machinery and electronics goods, world exports would increase to as much as $505 billion annually, compared with $359 billion if an overall agreement is reached without such agreements. Liberalisation of trade in environmental goods would further increase world exports by $8 billion.
The Commission says in a press release that “contrary to a common perception, an agreement would also lead to positive effects on tariff revenue for some regions, one of which is Sub-Saharan Africa”, particularly as a result of trade facilitation.
The Commission states that an agreement would not negatively affect wages of EU workers. Wages for skilled and unskilled labour, it says, would increase by around 0.3%.
The study is available at: http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/html/148337.htm (EH/transl.rt)