Trade Agreements and Negotiations on International Trade

¶ … Trade Agreements and Negotiations on International Trade

International Trade

Trade is important to countries all around the world. International trade opens up job opportunities and also leads to development of economic activity in every region of the trading country. The trading countries must also ensure that traders, whether self-employed entrepreneur, corporate executive or pensioner must bear the responsibility of making sure that goods and services are transported efficiently to global markets. The best way to advance in international trade is to work on two aspects namely, the Trade Commissioner Service, and also foster productive ways of negotiating and administering trade agreements and rules.

International Trade is defined as follows:

The law relating to the exchange of goods and services between nations. Legal issues can relate to tariffs and government restrictions on export and import, as well as the contracts between the trading partners." [LawyerLocator - Glossary of Terms]

The "old" theory of international trade focused on the theory of market interaction and their integration. The older theory stressed largely on globalization so as to make the trading world into a small global village working to bring better coordination and integration between the countries in the transformation of all the countries involved. By working along the lines set by the policies and regulations will being in monetary gains for all countries. However, the "new" theory of international trade is based on the principle of industrial organization approach. This new theory focuses on market shares between domestic and foreign firms. This theory works on the principle that a gain for the domestic firm in a country directly reciprocates a loss for the foreign firm or country.

International Trade Promoting Economic Growth in APEC

In the year 200, The Leaders meeting, the Ministerial meetings, and the CEO Summit in Los Cabos were held to find ways of creating opportunities, updating, and sharpening the vision of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum for the future. People who participated in this meeting spent a lot of time in preparing for them. The CEO's of three leading organizations of business in North America prepared a Joint Statement on how APEC can cater to provide global leadership and find ways of supporting greater economic growth in the Asia-Pacific region. In implementing the same policy, the NAFTA has been extremely successful especially, since the economic partners at different levels of development have been able to attain higher levels in growth, trade, and creating jobs. This is why NAFTA has served to be an example for APEC when it comes to its future strategies and implementation action.

The meetings that took place in October 2002 were held at a favorable time. The members of the World Trade Organization strongly stressed on creating international trade with the markets in Doha in 2001. This obligation was firmly imposed by the United States in August 2002 following the U.S. Congress action to complete the new trade promotion authority. This reinforcement signifies that for the first time in many years, the world governments have agreed to support greater market liberalization and economic integration, largely because they can identify with that the benefits of economic growth that need to be more unanimously shared, not just among countries, but within them as well.

There have been many economic lessons that have served as a lesson for over the past decade, but the most important has perhaps been that markets function ideally within an institutional framework working on the rule of law, democracy, and transparency. This framework serves as an excellent example in economics and also stresses on the need for such a framework at all levels of governance and at all stages of economic development.

Each and every government all around the world is concerned about the wherewithal to endorse greater private investment by adopting and implementing the right set of domestic and trade policies. This is because effective policies will attract investors, both on the foreign and domestic front, and if these policies are not there then they may shy away from investing. The "Monterrey Consensus" states that "To attract and enhance inflows of productive capital, countries need to continue their efforts to achieve a transparent, stable and predictable investment environment, with proper contract enforcement and respect for property rights...."

This quote just amplifies that the people in every country have the right to good governance and should also respect the rule of law. This implies the need to have independent judicial systems and mechanisms to fight against corruption. APEC is working on these challenges to obtaining the objective of "Strengthening Economic Legal Infrastructure."

Another element that is essential to this is 'transparency' because it is imperative for the development and functioning of strong economies and markets. This requires governments to ensure that laws and other governmental decisions are also shared with its citizens before they are implemented, and also to set up procedures for persons to offer suggestions into the decision-making process. These types of consultation procedures are rather successful because they have proven to provide a ways to promote the sound and predictable rules necessary for economic development and continued growth.

In today's world, achieving greater economic participation is also crucial. The past has been characterized with an economic growth that occurred in an unbalanced manner leaving behind too many people and also countries. This is why the APEC countries should strive on their level of development to improve their training systems, and form ways to provide assistance in response to economic dislocations, and promote continuation learning. In the new digital world, it is important for people to have greater access to the latest technologies. These goals can easily be achieved when the governments and the private sector collaborate together to use maximum power of human capacity and mind.

Innovation is a vital element for prosperous growth in trade. In order to encourage innovation in the private sector it is essential to have obligations towards respect for intellectual property rights, and the right implementation of laws to guarantee them, since they are critical to nurturing innovation by the private sector. Governments should also increase access of people in the study of science in schools and colleges, because it is important to recognize the importance of the central role of science in the new economy, since they this study helps to promote and maintain a constant culture of innovation.

International trade also uses the latest technology to make it efficient and productive. Biotechnology is being used for the prospect of improving the nutrition in food simultaneously lowering the overall cost. How far our societies benefit from this new technology depends directly on the degree of rigid approach each adopts. The recent declaration by governments at a "World Food Summit/Five Years Later" states that "The introduction of tried and tested technologies including biotechnology should be accomplished in a safe manner and adapted to local conditions to help improve agricultural productivity in developing countries." We agree with that statement. [The Business Roundtable: International Trade and Investment]

The key objective of the trade summit is to foster ways that will help third world countries gain greater benefits from trade. The summit members support this objective because it will help in the area of global equity because the chances for economic growth in the North are connected directly to the economic state in the South. After Doha, the WTO has been on a mission to expand its building efforts in developing countries. In the past, there have been many APEC governments, along with the support of business groups, contributing to help these third-world countries. A huge amount of money is being invested into these efforts, to help the developing countries. To see the progress in every country that is being helped, an independent evaluation of how well the trade-related technical assistance and capacity-building programs are being conducted.

International Trade and Investment In America

Introduction

Today America's economy, workers, and businesses are gaining in monetary terms from trade, exports, and overseas investments. However, this appears to come as surprise to most Americans who believe they are living in a bad economy that just doesn't seem to come out of the recession.

The truth or better to say is that the reality is that Americans have very little knowledge about trade and investment in their own country and abroad. The little know-how they have about trade and investment has been shaped by bitter debates over The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and World Trade Organization (GATT/WTO) agreements. Americans are very familiar with the costs associated with trade such as the stories related to bankruptcy or the loss of a friend's plant located overseas; they get to know very little about the benefits of having business overseas, such as economic growth for their company and their country. In short, Americans are only getting to know one side of the story.

In America, employees, retirees, and investors in companies already involved in international trade do not have the knowledge that trade is the driving force of America's economy today, also accountable for a third of all the recent economic growth and a quarter of all new openings in civilian jobs in the '90s. On one hand though majority of the Americans believe that their nation will be an inevitable participant in the new global economy, they fail to understand that trade agreements implemented today will only determine the depth of America's position in the future world. They also don't understand that international trade and investment are significantly important to the growth and future of American businesses, regardless of size.

In America today, the problem lies in the fact that there is a widening gap between what they see and the reality, between global facts and figures and their own fear. Many Americans are of the view that trade especially in the international sphere leads to many people losing their jobs, rather than creating new ones for them, they also don't support trade agreements believing that they only help big businesses but only harm the economy of America, its workers, and small business entrepreneurs.

The U.S. Companies Business Pursuits Bringing Positive Change to Latin America

U.S. companies participate in business in different countries not only for cheap labor but also because they work to integrate their corporate codes of conduct into their Latin American operations. These codes enforce the concepts of integrity, diversity, teamwork, mutual respect, open communication and innovation into the working world. This implies in creating ethical business practices in other countries. Technically, U.S. companies are only improving the way companies work with all the stakeholders, especially their employees, customers, business partners and suppliers, competitors, stockholders and the communities in which the business functions.

The U.S. Companies Business Pursuits Bringing Positive Change to China

U.S. holds a great share of business revenues in China because their companies buy, sell and invest in China for its good quality of products and cheap labor costs. The participation of the U.S. has had a positive impact on the corporate world in China. They have helped contribute to establishing China's economy and society; setting their standards for environmental performance and worker health and safety; and also emphasizing on the importance of community involvement.

New WTO Trade Negotiations to Boost the Economy

The Business Roundtable believes that the U.S. holds a strong position when it comes to investing in the national interest for the United States and that it must be the leader in launching, and participating in new WTO negotiations.

The United States no doubt is the leader when it comes to participating in open markets because the U.S. is aware of the fact that with their market being the most open in the world, and with their highly competitive companies, workers and farmers in the world, they can gain enormously once the foreign barriers to products like goods and services through trade agreements are eliminated, otherwise they will face terrible losses if these barriers persist. Due to the foreign barriers the U.S. has been facing problems such as, inadequate intellectual property protection, investment distortions, customs red tape, and other barriers have cropped up becoming a major problem for U.S. exporters and their workers. The U.S. agricultural exports are levied with a raft of tariff and non-tariff barriers.

The decline of the U.S. trade balance has left many interest groups with a view that that now is not the time to find and discover new ways of initiating trade. Some businessmen believe that the question has been misunderstood. Entering into new trade agreements has the potential to enhance economic growth in those countries that are a victim to weak economies, since that will elevate the demand for American exports.

Trade is good for economy, good for business, good for workers, good for farmers and good for consumers in every country. It is largely due to the trade negotiations that the U.S. exports continue to escalate on a good scale. In 1996-1998, real exports went up by 30% from the period between 1993-1995. These exports are the driving force for the economic growth and job creation in the United States. It not just the businesses that are benefiting but even the American workers benefit from expanding trade. According to a study, nearly 12 million U.S. jobs are supported by exports.

It is know that with the opportunities created by the global economy come fears of facing losses. This is why it is important to take a greater insight into the cost leveled against international trade and overcome these fears. For one thing it is important to realize that there is no direct connection between imports and lost jobs. It should also be recognized that trade deficit originates from many factors; so that is why any linkages to trade policies are incorrect.

Improving Economy with Trade Negotiations

The Business Roundtable has created four important principles to lead the U.S. policymakers in the right direction:

The United States need trade and investment policies to make sure that trade accomplishes its purpose of improving the American and global living standards.

U.S. leadership is critical to continued trade liberalization.

The rules-based trading system is the basis of the global economy and implementation of the rules is the foundation for public trust and support for U.S. participation.

Business is a most important element in the global economy and is also the driving force for developing and implementing enhanced trade policy.

The United States aims to improve the world trading system to enhance the global economy. The reason it is important to implement new world trade negotiations that took place in 1999 without setting differences in the economic performance in different countries, or election cycles. Americans are also confident that the new trade negotiations will make the economy of the United States more successful, since the Uruguay Round has been and continues to deliver, an increase the economic growth. The WTO Ministerial in Seattle served as an opportunity for the U.S. government to promote the launching of new WTO negotiations. There are several ways to guide the trade negotiators in achieving the agenda set for new WTO negotiations, to attain U.S. interests. They are as follows:

To understand what a new WTO negotiation can achieve, it is important to divide the issues into two categories:

The built-in agenda that records the ongoing negotiations, and Review and growth of various WTO agreements.

The reports show the benefits of the agreements to the United States after China was accepted to the World Trade Organization (WTO) and PNTR. The reports contain these findings: in these reports are the following:

California's 1998 exports to China totaled $3.5 billion. Its telecommunications industries would benefit greatly from PNTR's elimination of tariffs on network equipment, computers, peripherals, components and instrumentation.

Florida's 1998 exports to China were $800.2 million. Under PNTR, tariffs on oranges, lemons and grapefruit would decrease from 40% to 12%, providing significant benefits to citrus exporters. The Chinese market for grapefruit alone could reach $40 million.