Nick Phipps, Author at UKTPO

UK-Australia FTA – Elbow bumps and all

16 June 2021 Michael Gasiorek is Professor of Economics and Director of the UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex. Guillermo Larbalestier is Research Assistant in International Trade at the University of Sussex and Fellow of the UKTPO. Indications of a trade deal between the UK and Australia first surfaced soon after the Brexit referendum. This week it was announced that the two nations had agreed on the broad terms of the deal. The news was accompanied by images of PM Boris Johnson and his Australian counterpart, Scott Morrison, bumping elbows (the new handshake, if you will) and exchanging chocolate bars over baskets of British and Australian products. The deal has significance for several reasons. First, it is the first trade deal outside the EU that was designed from scratch. So far, UK trade agreements with other non-EU countries have been “continuity agreements” that were almost entirely based on pre-existing deals between the EU and the other nations (we include UK-Japan as de facto in this category). Secondly, it signifies the UK’s continued commitment to liberalising and opening trade, particularly with those countries with shared values, as part of its post-Brexit and Global Britain campaign. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-06-16T16:17:11+01:0016 June 2021|UK - Non EU|13 Comments

‘Global Britain’ is a slogan: global Britain is a fact

5 May 2021. L. Alan Winters is Professor of Economics and Founding Director of the UKTPO. Guillermo Larbalestier is Research Assistant in International Trade at the University of Sussex and Fellow of the UKTPO. The Government’s Integrated Review, Global Britain in a competitive age, published in March 2021, presents the Government’s vision for the UK in 2030 and outlines plans to achieve it. It emphasises the importance of Britain asserting its influence on the world stage by sustaining advancements in science and technology, shaping the rules-based international order, and strengthening security and defences at home and overseas. It has a section titled “Putting trade at the heart of Global Britain” and expresses support for the multilateral system, designing rules and ensuring trade is fair and efficient. The document says that it is a “guide for action”; it says lots of the right things, but on the ground the UK is going backwards. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-05-05T13:11:00+01:005 May 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|1 Comment

Two months in: the impact of Brexit on UK trade

20 April 2021. Michael Gasiorek is Professor of Economics and Director of the UKTPO. Yohannes Ayele is Research Fellow in the Economics of Brexit at the University of Sussex and Fellow of the UKTPO. A decline in trade with the EU was expected following the coming into force of the Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the UK and the EU on the 1st of January. Nevertheless, when the UK January trade figures were released in early March, almost unanimously commentators were surprised by the extent of the decline. We now have the data for February and so in this blog we update the numbers and discuss their significance. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-04-20T12:22:52+01:0020 April 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|17 Comments

Challenges ahead for the UK to join CPTPP

16 April 2021 Minako Morita-Jaeger is an International Trade Policy Consultant and Fellow of the UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex. On 1st February, the UK asked to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP)[1]. While the request appears motivated more by foreign policy than economic benefit, joining the CPTPP will require the UK to accept CPTPP rules which may impact on UK economy and society in specific ways. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-04-16T15:37:18+01:0016 April 2021|UK - Non EU|8 Comments

The Craft of Trade Warfare

31 March 2021 Erika Szyszczak is Professor Emerita and a Fellow of the UKTPO. Trade has become a new tool of political and economic warfare. Recent years have seen a rise in threats and the disruptive use of use tariffs, export and import bans to further political aims by the two economic superpowers, the US and China. Other countries wishing to assert greater political influence, such as Russia or Turkey, have joined the fray. Although the disputes are characterized as being between States, the real impact of trade wars is felt by businesses, workers, consumers and ordinary citizens. The impact is felt in the COVID-19 pandemic, where critical supplies of medical products or Personal Protective Equipment are essential in a health emergency. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-03-31T12:20:12+01:0031 March 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|0 Comments

A Fine Kettle of Fish

23 March 2021 Michael Gasiorek is Professor of Economics and Director of the UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex. Suzannah Walmsley is Principal Consultant and Fisheries and Aquaculture Business Development Manager at ABPmer. Last week the UK’s trade data for January 2021 came out and the evidence was pretty striking. It showed a dramatic decline in UK exports and imports in January, and particularly so with the EU. Now some of this will have been driven by Covid-related lockdown restrictions, and some of the dramatic fall in trade with the EU itself may have been driven by firms’ stockpiling in November and December to protect themselves against the much-publicised potential border difficulties arising from the UK’s exit from the EU and the end of the transition period. In this blog we dig a bit deeper into those numbers and focus just on fisheries. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-03-23T16:10:39+00:0023 March 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|1 Comment

What can we learn from one month’s trade data: UK-EU trade in January 2021

13 March 2021 Yohannes Ayele is Research Fellow in the Economics of Brexit, Nicolo Tamberi is Research Officer in Economics, and Guillermo Larbalestier is Research Assistant in International Trade at the University of Sussex. All are Fellows of the UKTPO. On Friday 12 March, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) released the UK’s trade in goods figures for January 2021, providing data for the first month following the end of the Brexit transition period. The ONS has provided their own interpretation of these data portraying a rather gloomy scene for UK trade. We have downloaded the raw data and here offer some initial thoughts on what we learn from the changes in trade flows in January 2021. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-03-15T09:43:48+00:0015 March 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|0 Comments

The UK must develop a cross-cutting strategy for trade and climate policy in order to become a world leader in both

3 March 2021 Dr Emily Lydgate is Senior Lecturer in Environmental Law at the University of Sussex, and a Deputy Director of UKTPO. Chloe Anthony is a doctoral researcher at the University of Sussex. This blog was first published on LSE British Politics and Policy. Due to differences in underlying logic, there is much potential for trade and climate policy to conflict. Fundamentally, world trade rules and agreements aim to facilitate the free movement of goods and services, and restrict subsidies that distort trade. Climate policy, on the other hand, aims to support the low-carbon economy and restrict trade in high-carbon goods and services. The UK was the first country to put its climate target into law in 2008; it has met its first two interim targets for emissions reduction and is on course to meet the third in 2022. Yet analysis has shown that the first two emissions targets were met due to changes in accounting methods and the financial crisis, rather than due to effective policymaking. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-03-03T10:51:59+00:003 March 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|1 Comment

Two key things to know about Freeports

25 February 2021 Peter Holmes is a Fellow of the UKTPO. Guillermo Larbalestier is Research Assistant in International Trade at the University of Sussex. The Government’s competition for proposals to create ten Freeports across the UK came to a close earlier this month with an announcement of the successful locations expected soon. Freeports are areas within a country that are outside its customs territory. Goods coming into the country via Freeports are exempt from paying tariffs until they enter the mainland or are shipped to another country. In the UK Freeports model[1] these areas may also be subject to special regulatory, tax, or subsidy rules. Such features may make the terms Enterprise Zone, Special Economic Zone or, the more general, Free Trade Zone more appropriate. The full details of all bids have not been published but summary reports indicate wide variety of business cases. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-02-25T09:56:44+00:0025 February 2021|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|0 Comments

Enhancement and Enforcement of International Trade Rules: The EU Leads the Way

18 February 2021 Erika Szyszczak is Professor Emerita and a Fellow of the UKTPO. Traditionally, the legal enforcement of obligations was the Achilles heel of bilateral and multilateral international agreements. The EU has signalled that it wants to conduct international trade based upon the rule of law. The demise of the WTO Appellate body since 11 December 2019 has focused the EU into using and bolstering its own Dispute Resolution mechanisms in international trade agreements. The significance of this approach is seen in the Trade and Co-operation Agreement between the EU and the UK 2020, containing innovative procedures for rebalancing the trade elements of the TCA (and ultimately cancelling them) if one side changes its standards in ways that materially affect trade. Such rebalancing can be triggered in several circumstances, including via periodic reviews of the whole trade relationship. […]

By Nick Phipps|2021-02-18T14:59:48+00:0018 February 2021|UK- EU|0 Comments

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