New analysis presented in our Briefing Paper, The challenges facing UK firms: Trade and supply chains reveals that UK businesses are struggling with increased costs, labour and skill issues and supply shortages following the UK’s departure from the European Union. The authors of the Briefing Paper analysed over 2,800 responses to three surveys issued by the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), to help produce a long-term perspective on the challenges facing UK businesses. They examine the main challenges and opportunities reported by businesses over 2021 and 2022 and two specific trade-related areas. The first is on the difficulties and advantages for businesses arising from the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA). The second is on supply chain challenges. The results show that as a result of the TCA, UK businesses are reporting significant difficulties and disadvantages, including increased red tape, bureaucracy and costs as well as shipping and transport issues. Such increases inevitably lead to both shortages of products and rises in prices for the UK public. Read Briefing Paper 73: THE CHALLENGES FACING UK FIRMS: TRADE AND SUPPLY CHAINS

Policy discussions about the effects and opportunities of international trade recognise that some parts of the economy might be more sensitive than others to changes in trade and/or trade policy, but the concept of a sensitive industry has different meanings. In our Briefing Paper, Identifying sensitive and strategic sectors, we aim to provide a conceptual framework for considering the factors that could identify industries that may be sensitive or strategic from a trade perspective; to review the range of information that can identify these factors; and to illustrate the ways in which this information can be usefully applied. Accompanying the Briefing Paper is a spreadsheet file with the underlying indicators and some tools of analysis which we hope will be of use and interest to some readers. The spreadsheet also includes detailed information about data sources and any data adjustments made. Read Briefing Paper 71: IDENTIFYING SENSITIVE AND STRATEGIC SECTORS

Despite the positive narrative around the growth in global supply chains, we currently see considerable discussion and growing concern over the issue of ‘supply chain resilience’. This Briefing Paper analyses the rationale behind greater supply chain resilience and sustainability and the policies being used to address vulnerability in certain supply chains. The author finds that policy responses do not always concern supply chain resilience and in many cases they may have been designed more to protect domestic producers. To negate the risk that supply chain resilience is used as a get-out clause for a wide range of industrial policy interventions. This Briefing Paper suggests a taxonomy for understanding different possible legitimate reasons for being concerned about supply chains and provides ten ways more international coordination could be achieved. Read Briefing Paper 67: Supply Chain Resilience: The dangers of ‘pick n mix’

This Briefing Paper aims to further understanding of the importance of trade in services for the UK economy. In particular, to shed light on the relationship between services and manufacturing trade, including an increasingly significant form of services trade known as Mode 5. We explore input-output data, firm-level data and the links between services and manufacturing in the context of the UK’s independent trade policy. The authors provide evidence that shows that the nature of how these services interact with goods trade and the policy or market access barriers and their implications need to be understood in much greater detail for policy purposes. Read Briefing Paper 66: Links between services and manufacturing trade in the UK: Mode 5 and beyond

The idea of introducing a Border Carbon Adjustment has been raised by various countries and major trading partners of the UK, most notably the EU, with its Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism. This Briefing Paper seeks to address the possible implications of a border carbon adjustment mechanism for the UK. We examine the potential impact on specific industries and consider implications of cooperation with the EU on ETS schemes and BCAs, the pros and cons to the UK of applying such a new type of policy tool and for maintaining trade, investment and job stability in the UK, and with trading partners, and the extent to which it might counter the problem of carbon leakage. Read Briefing Paper 64: UK POLICY ON CARBON LEAKAGE

The influence of trade agreements in shaping UK food safety and standards has become almost existential in defining the UK’s post-EU identity. Acceding to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) is far from ideology-free: it symbolises the UK’s desire for regulatory independence from the EU and sets out a new post-Brexit direction. In this Briefing Paper, we look whether CPTPP accession seems likely to lower UK food standards and prevent the UK from agreeing to continued regulatory alignment with the EU. The answer is, not necessarily, if the UK Government communicates clearly and explicitly to CPTPP parties its intent to maintain its current regulatory approach, preferably through the use of so-called side letters. Read Briefing Paper 60: CPTPP AND AGRI-FOOD REGULATION: CROSSING THE EU-EXIT RUBICON?

International trade in a digital world is increasingly influenced by domestic regulation and is linked to non-trade areas such as health or climate change.  This makes it difficult for the WTO’s consensus- and trade-focused structure to make swift progress.  This Briefing Paper looks at how the G7 leadership across all four Trade Tracks could provide the necessary impetus for multilateral or open plurilateral solutions, in order to avert further fragmentation of the trading system. Read Briefing Paper 59: G7 LEADERS SHOULD DISCUSS INTERNATIONAL TRADE (SERIOUSLY)

The Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) between the UK and the EU came into force on the 1st January 2021. This Briefing Paper focusses on the provisions on trade in goods. It provides an analysis of the changes in tariffs; customs and trade facilitation; rules of origin; mutual recognition of testing and certification and takes a close look at one sector – fisheries – that was so contentious during the negotiations. The TCA is highly unusual in that it is an agreement which raises barriers to trade, and whilst it offers complete elimination of tariffs and quotas many other costs relating to trade have not been successfully minimized. Read Briefing Paper 52: TAKING STOCK OF THE UK-EU TRADE AND COOPERATION AGREEMENT:  TRADE IN GOODS 

The UK’s negotiation of a Free Trade Agreement with the EU will necessarily involve defining rules of origin, and before long negotiations with countries such as the US, Japan, and Australia will face the same task. In this Briefing Paper, the authors outline what rules of origin are, why they are needed, why they are complex, and which sectors in the UK may be most vulnerable to more restrictive rules of origin. They also discuss why the EU is highly unlikely to agree to the UK’s proposal on cumulation in rules of origin and argue that the obvious solution to this is for the UK to agree to the EU’s Pan Euro-Mediterranean Rules of Origin (PEM) which are the basis of the EU’s cumulation arrangements with a wide range of its neighbours. Any other outcome is likely to reduce the UK’s take up of trade preferences in its FTA with the EU. Read Briefing Paper 45: WE’RE GOING TO MAKE THEM AN OFFER THEY CAN REFUSE: RULES OF ORIGIN AND THE UK-EU FREE TRADE AGREEMENT

In this Briefing Paper, Michael Gasiorek and Anna Jerzewska provide an analysis of the UK’s recently published Command Paper. They argue that it highlights significant differences between the UK and the EU and does not fully address the challenges which come from the special situation around the border in the Irish Sea.  As a result, they warn that businesses should expect more paperwork, bureaucracy and additional costs on trade between Northern Ireland and Great Britain when the transition period ends in seven months’ time. Among the key stumbling blocks between the UK Government and EU that the Command Paper fails to resolve are the criteria for determining when a good is not at risk of moving into the EU market and would therefore not be subject to tariffs. Furthermore, permitting goods from Northern Ireland to freely enter Great Britain, could impact on the UK’s trade relations with third countries and even lead to WTO disputes. Read Briefing Paper 41: THE UNRESOLVED DIFFICULTIES OF THE NORTHERN IRELAND PROTOCOL