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A New KCG Paper on Foreign Trade and Sustainable Business Practices in Ghana is Published Today

5th October 2020
KCG Secretary
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Foreign trade and sustainability is high on the political agenda. German and international policy-makers undertake increasing efforts to use trade policy more effectively for sustainable development purposes. A growing toolbox is meant to facilitate these policy aims, including sustainability chapters in trade agreements, sustainable value chains and sustainability standards. Meanwhile, scientific evidence on how trading activities impact on firms’ sustainable behaviour is limited[...]

A New KCG Project on the Development of Global Value Chains in the Coffee Sector

24th August 2020
KCG Secretary
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International trade is widely recognised as a key driver of economic growth, poverty reduction and societal development. The United Nations (UN) thus considers international trade as an important instrument for individual countries and the world as a whole to achieve the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. The particular attention that the UN gives to the developing countries in this regard makes it clear that some of these countries still lie strongly behind as to their integration into the international trade and thus are farther away from benefiting from trade for their development[...]

Görg: Blockchain Technologies can Help Improve Transparency of Global Supply Chains

23rd July 2020
KCG Secretary
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The German Federal Government is working on a Supply Chain Law that will require German companies with more than 500 employees to better ensure that both human rights as well as environmental sustainability standards along their supply chains are well protected and/or followed. The Federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, Hubertus Heil, expects that the Draft Law can be passed by the cabinet in August and thus can enter the legislative process soon with the goal of being effective in 2021[...]

European Parliament Study on EU-China Trade and Investment Relations by BRUEGEL and IfW Available Online

2nd July 2020
KCG Secretary
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On July 1 Germany took over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union for the next six months. Under the overarching objective “Together for Europe’s Recovery”, Germany aims at working with all EU Member States to jointly overcome the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic, to support Europe’s economic recovery, to encourage innovation, social cohesion, solidarity and sustainability in Europe, to strengthen the European community of law and values as well as to further strengthen Europe’s role in dealing with global affairs (German Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2020)[...]

First UNIDO Webinar on the Future of Global Production Networks on June 30, 2020

24th June 2020
KCG Secretary
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Focusing on the challenges brought by the COVID-19 outbreak to the manufacturing sector, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) will organise a new webinar series “Future of Industrialization in a Post-Pandemic World” in cooperation with the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW) and the Kiel Centre for Globalization (KCG). The UNIDO Webinar Series will gather together international leading experts on the topic of industrialization from academia, business, politics, international organizations and NGOs to address the unprecedented industrial challenges in a post-pandemic world and to share their related research insights and knowledge from the practice with the interested participants[...]

Trade Recovery Requires Firm-specific Initiatives, Trade Policies and Global Collaboration

9th June 2020
KCG Secretary
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The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the global value chains (GVCs) substantially as it struck at their core regions, including China, Europe and the United States (Seric et al., 2020). According to a recent estimate of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) the merchandise trade volume worldwide would fall by between 13% to 32% in 2020. It is highly likely that the COVID-19 determined decline in world trade will be more substantial than the historical trade fall brought by the global financial crisis more than ten years ago[...]

A New KCG Research Project on the Impact of Special Economic Zones on Inequality

11th May 2020
KCG Secretary
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Inward foreign direct investment (FDI) is generally considered to be advantageous for supporting economic development in the emerging economies. Foreign investors do not only bring financial resources, know-how and technologies that are (relatively) limited on site into the FDI destination countries but also help local firms to gain better access to and benefit from the global production networks[...]