This week, another EU free trade agreement will come into force: the one with Singapore. The trade pact is also flanked by a separate investment protection agreement. The FTA will liberalise trade in goods but also in particular services. EU firms will benefit from greater market openings in financial services, …
Author: Iana Dreyer
Week in Brussels: Woman thing, trade podcasts, fries, EU market access
So here our Friday column on the smaller but yet notable stories in European Union trade this week. It’s been a packed week. It’s also been an odd week with everyone left in limbo over potential US auto tariffs. The Woman thing and podcasts With Thierry Breton now likely confirmed …
Cambodia EBA withdrawal: Democracy enforcement by administrative fiat?
The European Commission is handling a major file related to upholding international democracy norms in Cambodia through trade policy in a rather secretive fashion. Is it really following the rules in doing so? The Cambodian government has one month to respond to calls from the European Union to give opposition …
Trump trade agenda: a sense of drift
The European Union is still waiting for some form of official announcement on whether the White House will order import duties to be applied to autos and auto parts – or whether it will, as anticipated by most observers on both sides of the Pond – postpone the decision and …
Week ahead in EU Trade: Cambodia EBA suspension, US auto tariff deadline, CETA
This will be less a week of action on trade in the EU than a week of deadlines. Watch out for a possible first ever decision in the EU to recommend suspending Everything-But-Arms trade preferences following months of wrangling with Cambodia’s ruler Hun Sen. US auto tariff deadline The main …
Week in Brussels: Solomon Islands – How a trade file run by a far right MEP is starting to play out
The Pacific Islands Economic Partnership Agreement is now in the hands of French MEP André Rougé, a member of France’s far right Rassemblement National and the European Parliament’s Identity and Democracy group that includes far right parties from eight other European countries. A file that would have sailed quietly through …
Chinese digital and investment agenda makes headway in the WTO
This week China hosted a small ministerial conference with around thirty members of the World Trade Organization in Shanghai. Little has been reported about this low-key meeting. But it appears to have brought some movement in specific WTO files. The gathering in Shanghai offered the opportunity for the EU to …
Week Ahead: Shanghai, INTA, Borderlex Academy
Welcome back to our Monday morning Week Ahead columns! In these gloomy and rainy early days of November in Brussels we are looking to a packed agenda that could distract us from the bad weather. Shanghai WTO mini ministerial Commission and member state officials will be in Shanghai on Tuesday …
Week in Brussels: Processing Solomon Islands and Tonga, Australia, Mr Coherence
It’s a short week in most of the EU with many countries on holidays on Allsaints day on 1 November. This explains why our Week in Brussels column is coming out on Thursday instead of Friday. This week we had news on the end of intra-EU bilateral investment treaties and …
Comment: EU Mercosur tariff schedules reveal less visible industrial and agriculture bargains
The European Commission has published a lot of material about the free trade agreement concluded with Mercosur last summer. But the most interesting parts of the agreement – the market access offers in goods and services – were still missing. Whether it’s the effect of last Sunday’s elections in Argentina …
