Hanna Deringer

• The postponement of the planned ‘strategic partnership' between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the EU highlights deep concerns and divisions for opening up in the relationship. The EU-Singapore Free Trade Agreement (FTA), and Investment Partnership Agreement (IPA), stand alone as a success for EU-ASEAN trade relations, in an otherwise troubled landscape. Bilateral trade agreements with Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand remain...

The EU is hoping to revive the negotiations for a region-to-region agreement with the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), but few trading partners have faced such inauspicious fate as its members. The trade agreement with Singapore is concluded but remains unsigned and the EU Member States do not seem to be in a hurry to ratify the EU-Vietnam agreement due to the prospects of rejection by the European Parliament over labour issues. There is a...

The use of local content requirements (LCRs) has been growing for a long time. Used by developed as well as developing countries, they aim to promote the use of local inputs and serve the purpose of fostering domestic industries. Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Russia, Saudi Arabia and the USA are very frequent users of LCRs. India is by far the most prominent user, followed by Brazil. While LCRs might have perceived benefits related to specific policy...

President Trump assumed office with one of the more purposeful trade agendas in modern history: he pulled the US out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, launched a renegotiation of the US-Korea Free Trade Agreement, and is now threatening to take the US out of NAFTA. He is also considering other measures that would reduce trade activity – most of it supposedly to reduce the US trade deficit. The US Administration needs a new trade policy strategy if it wants to...