Services trade and investment are increasingly important for developing countries. The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) set benchmarks and a framework for future liberalisation. So far the GATS process has not achieved significant additional liberalisation.
1 January 1999
During the next WTO Round there will be strong calls explicitly to integrate environmental issues into the trade agenda.
1 January 1999
Negotiations at the World Trade Organization (WTO) increasingly affect cross-border investment, as many current trade issues have an investment dimension. In consequence, the European Commission has included investment in its proposed list of agenda items for a comprehensive "Millennium Round".
1 January 1999
This Briefing "fills in the gaps" with analysis of the expanding remit of trade policy, the role of the Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU), the future of preferences, and the challenge of measuring the impact of trade policy on development and the relief of poverty.
1 January 1999
IDS discussion papers;372
The paper examines the nexus between institutions and uncertainty in natural resources management contexts. It argues that conventional understandings of institutions fail to focus on how institutions deal with the ever-increasing forms of uncertainty impinging on rural livelihoods.
1 January 1999
36
John Humphrey and Hubert Schmitz have recently made an important contribution to the literature on trust and economic transactions between firms. Unfortunately, the evidence that high levels of societal trust contribute significantly to economic growth is far less reliable than they suggest. We...
1 January 1999
1 January 1999
48
A large majority of China's rural population were members of health prepayment schemes in the 1970's. Most of these schemes collapsed during the transition to a market economy. Some localities subsequently re-established schemes. In early 1997 a new government policy identified health prepayment...
1 January 1999
1 January 1999
1 January 1999
27
The aim of this introductory article is fourfold. First, it traces briefly the trajectory of the debate on industrial clusters in developing countries. Second, it identifies what we - as editors - consider the key issues in this debate. Third, it highlights how the contributors to this Special...
1 January 1999
23
Recent research on industrial clusters in developing countries has unearthed some notable success stories of small local enterprises growing fast and competing in export markets. This paper focuses on some conceptual and theoretical points which help to explain them. The discussion is conducted...
1 January 1999
