Welcome!

The last two years has been the dark ages for global trade. The combination of the economic downturn, a new American administration not inherently included to embrace free trade, and the stalled Doha Development Round has meant a lot of early night and long weekends at the World Trade Organization – nothing much has been happening.

But recently, really just in the past couple weeks, things seem to slowly be changing. Now I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but Global trade just might, if we are really lucky, be seeing a renaissance.  If so, (and let’s be honest, even if not so) it’s a perfect time to start this new blog covering all areas of global trade!

The following are some of the topics I will be covering in the near future. I welcome your comments and suggestions:

1. The free trade agreement between China and Taiwan (a.k.a. the Economic Co-operation Framework Agreement – think this title was created by Chinese speakers? Ugh.).
2. President Obama’s pledge to finally take action on the U.S. –Korea Free Trade Agreement (that’s South Korea. We’re still waiting on an FTA with the North so we can finally get all that duty free….um…oh…yeah…that’s right…nothing.).
3. Will the U.S. ever come up with a trade policy and what will it be? (Or, what exactly has Ron Kirk been doing for the past two years?)

Welcome and stay tuned!