trade

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

Softer Brexit, Softer Irish border?

8 December 2017 Jim Rollo is Deputy Director of UKTPO, Emeritus Professor of European Economics at the University of Sussex and Associate Fellow, Chatham House. Dr Peter Holmes Reader in Economics at the University of Sussex and Fellow of the UKTPO. The agreement to proceed to the next phase of Brexit talks is a step forward on the road to a softer Brexit. But it does not offer a definitive solution to the status of the Irish border, which will depend on the nature of the final agreement on the UK-EU trade relationship. At best, it represents an exercise in constructive ambiguity designed to allow the shape and length of any interim agreement, which will help determine the shape of the long-term agreement and, in turn, will be the basis of any permanent solution to the status of the Irish land border with Northern Ireland. […]

By Nick Phipps|2017-12-08T18:13:37+00:008 December 2017|UK- EU|2 Comments

Boeing – Bombardier and Brexit II

17 October 2017 Steve McGuire is Professor of Business and Public Policy and Head of the School of Business, Management and Economics at the University of Sussex. He is a Fellow of the UKTPO. Bombardier has found an elegant solution to its trade problems with the United States: sell a controlling stake in the programme to a company with deeper pockets to defend itself – and with a US production base immune, by definition, from US tariffs. […]

By Nick Phipps|2017-10-17T14:53:45+01:0017 October 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|1 Comment

The ins and outs of the Single Market

11 October 2017 One of the most critical issues for the Brexit negotiations in relation to trade is whether the UK should remain in the EU Single Market. The Conservatives claim that the UK will no longer be members of its single market or its customs union by the end of a two-year transitional period, but at his party’s conference, Jeremy Corbyn said a Labour government would strike a deal with the EU that "guarantees unimpeded access to the single market" after Brexit. We have produced a short, animated video that explains what the Single Market is, how it works and the ways it effects trade, and thereby the economy. This includes the role of the European Court of Justice. Ultimately, the video explains that there is a trade-off between making your laws independently and cooperating sufficiently to be a part of a bigger market and achieve higher incomes. https://vimeo.com/237091027 Republishing guidelines The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to he original resource on the our website. We do not however, publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT republish our articles online or in print for free.

By Nick Phipps|2017-10-11T15:47:19+01:0011 October 2017|UK- EU|3 Comments

Groundhog day: Is the Government White Paper on trade and Customs Bill a step forward?

11 October 2017 Dr Michael Gasiorek is Senior Lecturer in Economics at the University of Sussex and Director and Managing Director of InterAnalysis Reading the Government’s White Paper on trade, and the Customs Bill on future customs arrangements, together with Monday’s statement from the Prime Minister seemed like a Groundhog day moment. In other words, this is somewhere we have been before – repeatedly. […]

By Nick Phipps|2017-10-11T10:33:01+01:0011 October 2017|UK- EU|3 Comments

Grandfathering Free Trade Agreements and Rules of Origin: What might appear bilateral is in fact trilateral!

27 September 2017 Dr Peter Holmes Reader in Economics and Dr Michael Gasiorek is Senior Lecturer in Economics at the University of Sussex and Director and Managing Director of InterAnalysis respectively. Both are Fellows of the UKTPO. With respect to the post-Brexit period, the UK needs to sort out its trade relationships not just with the EU but also with non-EU countries. In regard to the EU, Mrs May’s stated objective is for an “implementation” period during which “access to one another’s markets should continue on current terms”, such that “businesses and public services should only have to plan for one set of changes in the relationship between the UK and the EU”. However, for this to be possible, the UK will also have to deal with the relationship with non-EU countries. In this blog, we focus on an important aspect of Free Trade Agreements (FTA) which centres around something which is a bit technical and often not well understood – called “Rules of Origin” (RoOs).[1] […]

By Nick Phipps|2017-09-27T09:47:33+01:0027 September 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|15 Comments

Government proposals on goods trade only cover first few weeks after Brexit

23 August 2017 Dr Peter Holmes Reader in Economics at the University of Sussex and Fellow of the UKTPO The government’s new paper “Continuity in the availability of goods for the EU and the UK – a position paper“ acknowledges the problems that will be created by a hard Brexit in which there is a disruption in the systems for verifying compliance with mandatory standards. The problem is that its substantive proposals deal with only the most immediate disruptions in the sale of goods that are already in the supply chain at the moment of Brexit. The official description acknowledges this: “This paper outlines the UK’s position on continuity in the availability of goods in UK and EU markets at the point of EU exit” (my italics). Yet, the key requirement for the British economy is that there needs to be a permanent system in place for ensuring that UK product inspection systems are recognised by the EU for goods made after Brexit. […]

By Nick Phipps|2017-08-23T15:30:50+01:0023 August 2017|UK- EU|3 Comments

The economic benefits of Brexit – revisited and rectified

21 August 2017 L. Alan Winters CB, Professor of Economics and Director of UKTPO. Economists for Free Trade (EfFT) are back, offering the Introduction to an unpublished – and hence unknown – report that claims £135 billion benefits from Brexit. It not only repeats the previous claim that GDP will increase by 4% if the UK adopts free trade, which I characterised as ‘doubly misleading’ in April, but it adds in an extra 2% from ‘improved regulation’, 0.6% from our net budget contribution to the EU and 0.2% from removing the ‘subsidy to unskilled immigration’. It also promises faster growth as well. I’ll come back to free trade, but, first, what regulations will be improved? We are not told. Similarly, what subsidy to immigration? Who knows? The budget contribution to the EU may be saved, but we will need to spend much of it on providing replacements for various EU regulatory bodies such as the European Medicines Agency, on negotiating new deals on things like airlines or nuclear isotopes, supporting farmers (which EfFT apparently accepts), on customs formalities on trade with the EU, on managing alleged unfair trade and on trade disputes, etc. Until we see the details, you have to [...]

By Nick Phipps|2017-08-21T13:44:40+01:0021 August 2017|UK - Non EU, UK- EU|2 Comments

The Customs Union: The Fiction of ‘Frictionless’ Trade

14 August 2017 After Brexit, the UK will have to leave the EU Customs Union (CU) and become a legally separate customs territory. It might then, however, seek to create a new Customs Union with the EU to cover their mutual trade. The UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex (UKTPO) has produced this short animated video that explains what this entails, and what kind of an agreement the UK and the EU would need to establish in order to achieve the same level of trade costs as we have now. Ultimately, the video explains, a Customs Union will not produce ‘frictionless’ trade without re-creating several aspects of current EU membership. With Brexit negotiations already underway, it emphasises that maintaining a customs union is just one part of the story; and not, by itself, the be all and end all for achieving a smooth trading process. https://vimeo.com/229297381 Republishing guidelines The UK Trade Policy Observatory believes in the free flow of information and encourages readers to cite our materials, providing due acknowledgement. For online use, this should be a link to he original resource on the our website. We do not however, publish under a Creative Commons license. This means you CANNOT [...]

By Nick Phipps|2017-08-14T11:00:37+01:0014 August 2017|UK- EU|4 Comments

What do the General Election Manifestos say about International Trade? UKIP

26 May 2017 Compiled by Fellows of the UKTPO Brexit will leave many areas of UK policy open to change. International trade policy is among the most important of these for UK prosperity and also among the most immediate because the status quo cannot simply be extended. This is the fifth in a series of blogs reporting what the major political parties say about trade policy in their 2017 manifestos, as they become available. The UK Trade Policy Observatory (UKTPO) has set out a series of issues that it believes should be considered in any election manifesto that might form the basis of the UK’s future trade policy. The table below checks whether or not the UKIP Manifesto mentions these important elements explicitly or implicitly. Following that we offer a brief commentary on the treatment of trade policy in the manifesto. […]

By Nick Phipps|2017-05-26T16:12:22+01:0026 May 2017|UK- EU|0 Comments

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