BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest

Lead Stories
RITE OF SPRING: UNCERTAIN WEEKS AHEAD IN PUSH FOR DOHA DEAL	Trade officials in Geneva (and readers of this news bulletin) could be forgiven for feeling a sense of déjà vu. For the third year in a row, WTO Members have aimed to strike a framework Doha Round deal on agriculture and manufacturing trade by spring. For the third year in a row, they are in serious danger of failing to do so.
SLUGGISH START TO WIPO TALKS ON IMPLEMENTING DEVELOPMENT AGENDA RECOMMENDATIONS	Progress was slow during the first meeting of the World Intellectual Property Organisation's newly-minted committee on development issues, as officials managed to discuss how to implement only six of some 45 reform proposals aimed at placing development concerns at the heart of the institution's work.
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In Brief	WTO in Brief
EU-India FTA May Not Happen This Year, Suggests Brussels Reserve Bank of India Speaks Out Against Bilateral Trade Agreements

Events        &        Resources
Events	13 - 14 March, Chatham House, London, UK. CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY 2008: SUSTAINING MOMENTUM AND RESPONSIBLE GROWTH. At their 2007 Summit, the G8 nations signalled an unprecedented interest in corporate responsibility. Not only did they encourage the business sector to use specific Corporate Responsibility instruments, such as the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and the UN Global Compact, but they committed to establishing a high level dialogue with leading emerging economies on the subject. This high-level conference is now in its fifth successive year as a joint venture between Chatham House and FTSE Group. The two day event will examine the latest thinking on the responsibilities of business, government and civil society and assess how far corporate responsibility has become a normal part of everyday business. For more information, please refer to the conference website at http://www.chathamhouse.org.uk/events/conferences/view/-/id/111/.
Resources	INTEGRATION OF MARKETS VS. INTEGRATION BY AGREEMENTS. By Nathalie Aminian, K.C. Fung, and Francis Ng. The World Bank, March 2008. This paper provides an analysis of the two channels of regional integration: integration via markets and integration via agreements. Given that East Asia and Latin America are two fertile regions where both forms of integrations have taken place, the authors examine the experiences of these two areas. There are four related results. First, East Asia had been integrating via markets long before formal agreements were in vogue in the region. Latin America, by contrast, has primarily used formal regional trade treaties as the main channel of integration. Second, despite the relative lack of formal regional trade treaties until recently, East Asia is more integrated among itself than Latin America. Third, from a purely economic and trade standpoint, the proper sequence of integrations seems to be first integrating via markets and subsequently via formal regional trade agreements. Fourth, regional trade agreements often serve multiple constituents. The reason why integrating via markets first can be helpful is because this can give stronger political bargaining power to the outward-looking economic-oriented forces within the country. The paper is available online at http://www-wds.worldbank.org/external/default/main?menuPK=64187510&pagePK=64193027&piPK=64187937&theSitePK=523679&menuPK=64154159&searchMenuPK=64258669&theSitePK=523679&entityID=000158349_20080304084358&searchMenuPK=64258669&theSitePK=523679.
BRIDGES Weekly Trade News Digest is made possible through the generous support of the Government of the United Kingdom (DFID) and ICTSD's core donors including the Governments of Finland, Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden; Christian Aid (UK) and NOVIB (NL). BRIDGES Weekly also benefits from support for the BRIDGES series of publications from donors including the Rockefeller Foundation and the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation.