Stories

In the news: Diversifying trade and a fashionable success

7 September 2012
ITC News
ITC’s Executive Director discusses trade issues in the United Arab Emirates with al-Bayan, while ITC’s Ethical Fashion Initiative is covered in the New York Times.

In an interview with al-Bayan, a United Arab Emirates daily, ITC’s Executive Director Patricia Francis urges the country to step up its efforts to diversify its economy. Despite being the 31st biggest exporter in the world, Ms Francis points out that because a majority of the UAE’s exports is oil-related, this could prevent the economy from expanding in the future.

Ms Francis nevertheless praises the already on-going effort in the UAE to diversify the economy, pointing to growth in the performance of other products, such as cork, gum and resin, as well as in a number of agro-food products.

In the interview, Ms Francis also says that, while the UAE has imposed some new trade tariffs in recent years, the country is setting a good example for other countries in the region to follow because of its low import tariffs.

Continue reading the whole interview with Ms Patricia Francis on al-Bayan (in Arabic).

The International Trade Centre’s much-lauded Ethical Fashion Initiative receivesextended coverage in the New York Times. The newspaper carries an interview with Mr Simone Cipriani, who is in charge of the Ethical Fashion initiative, in which he explains how the project came about and why it has proven so successful in employing people from poor communities and top designers such as Vivienne Westwood and Ilaria Venturini Fendi to work with ITC on the project.

Continue reading about ITC’s Ethical Fashion Initiative in the New York Times.

The Jakarta Post reports on the upcoming World Export Development Forum, which will be co-hosted by ITC and the Government of Indonesia in Jakarta on 15-17 October. “As markets in South-South countries continue to expand, we need to find ways to increase trade between us. It is important to facilitate exports that can contribute to development of our countries,” Gusmardi Bustami, the Director-General for national export development in the trade ministry told the paper. 

Pakistan’s Dawn.com writes that data from ITC’s Trade Map tool has been used to discover a discrepancy of $2 billion in values of goods imported from China in 2011. According to the country’s Federal Board of Revenue, the discrepancy is because of under-invoicing ‘attributed to different accounting periods and methodologies’ 

The race to replace Pascal Lamy as head of the World Trade Organization, of which ITC a partner agency, has begun. The New Zealand Herald writes that Tim Groser, New Zealand’s Trade Minister, has said that we will be candidate to replace Lamy when he steps down next year. Meanwhile Africa Newswrites that Alan Kyerematen, a Ghanaian former trade minister, has also set his eyes on the top job. Reuters, the news agency, also carries an analysis into who could be candidates to lead the now 157-strong organization.