News and analysis on trade policy in Europe
Friday, April 25, 2025
Updated at 18.15 CET/17.15 GMT. With only 17 days to go until the United Kingdom formally leaves the European Union’s single market, the issue of how the ratification process will proceed in the EU while respecting the treaties and the rights of the European and national parliaments has come into …
This has been Brexit week on both sides of the Channel. The dinner between Ursula von der Leyen and Boris Johnson on Wednesday night did not bring us closer to a breakthrough on the most thorny issue of ‘the level playing field’.
Some developments at the WTO this week…. Negotiators adopt second version of e-commerce agreement draft text Many observers note that negotiations on a text that would set rules for digital trade in the 21st Century have had difficulties making meaningful headway this autumn. Eighty-six WTO members have been looking in …
Faced with the prospect of a trade agreement with four South American countries that has taken more than twenty years to negotiate being voted down amidst wide-spread public opinion fear it might set ablaze the Amazon forest, the European Commission has taken the initiative. And it wants to move fast …
The debate over next year’s announced European Union ‘Carbon Border Adjustment Measure’ is slowly gearing up. While nobody knows what measure will be put forward in the end – what we already know now is that it portends a major political battle next year over the future of existing EU …
Post-COVID 19 TRIPS campaigning intensifies NGOs such as Médecins Sans Frontières (the French ‘Doctors without Borders’ humanitarian organisation) are joining the campaign of developing countries led by India and South Africa at the WTO who are asking for sweeping flexibilities and/or a waiver on intellectual property rules. The aim is …
