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Simon Lester

Charnovitz: USTR Refuses Public Disclosure of US-Russia Trade Agreement

One final Steve Charnovitz Eyes on Trade cross-post: by Steve Charnovitz This is a follow-up to my blog post of July 20, 2009 about my efforts to use the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to get the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) to release the text of

Investor-State in FTAs

In the context of the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, the Emergency Committee for American Trade makes the following point: The U.S.-Australia FTA did not include one vitally important component of a strong investment chapter, namely investor-state dispute settlement. ECAT very strongly urges that investor-state dispute settlement be included

In Praise of Trade Deficits

From the always provocative Don Boudreaux: Beyond contributing to American economic vitality, foreign investment here signals global confidence in that vitality. Investors go long only in assets or places that promise a reasonable prospect of future profits. These facts are why the recent decline in America's trade deficit

Mutual Assured Dumping

The AFP mentions the following interesting fact in relation to the WTO complaint by China against EU anti-dumping duties on fasteners (e.g., screws and bolts): In one of the biggest anti-dumping cases against China, the EU decided after an investigation to impose levies on imports of some Chinese fasteners,

WTO Litigation Costs and the Seal Products Case

I was recently talking to someone writing a paper about the costs of litigating WTO disputes, so I found the following quite interesting. Commenting on the Seal Products dispute, a lawyer who would probably know these things suggests the following in relation to that case: A WTO challenge would likely

GATT Article VI:5 and Dual Remedies for AD/CVD

GATT Article VI:5 states: No product of the territory of any contracting party imported into the territory of any other contracting party shall be subject to both anti-dumping and countervailing duties to compensate for the same situation of dumping or export subsidization. In its first written submission in the

"Devaluations Cause Trade Tensions"

This statement comes from an article in this week's Economist. Earlier in the piece, they talk about the Great Depression and make the following point that helps explain why devaluations cause trade tensions: Countries that cut the link to gold quickly and allowed their currencies to fluctuate endured

Chief Trade Adviser to Forum Island Countries

This looks like a great job for somebody: The [Pacific Island Forum] Secretariat is looking to appoint a suitably qualified and experienced person to work as the: • Chief Trade Adviser to Forum Island Countries for Pacific Agreement on Closer Economic Relations (PACER) Plus negotiations The Chief Trade Adviser will be

Charnovitz: USTR Advisory Groups Need To Be Improved

The final cross-post from Steve Charnovitz: by Steve Charnovitz Having advisory groups is important for governments and international organizations. Left to themselves, government bureaucrats and international civil servants are often unimaginative and lack good ground-level information. As I have noted in my scholarship over the past decades (see my website

Danny Bradlow on Foreign Buying of African Land

He has some suggestions over at Vox for how to make sure those selling the land benefit: * Ensure adequate transparency by either following or adopting similar transparency standards to those contained in theExtractive Industry Transparency Initiative; * Ensure that the projects conform to best social and environmental practices by either committing