Trade
Why China tripled its heavy truck shipments to Central Asia: Unravelling the influence of Russia’s war in Ukraine
Trade data shows Central Asia’s imports from China are up sharply, as the region is progressively integrated into a Beijing-Moscow economic axis.
Central Asia is increasingly a…
Why the Black Sea Grain Initiative must be restored
Earlier this week, Russia announced that it would suspend its participation in the Black Sea Grain Initiative, the landmark diplomatic deal brokered by the United Nations and…
The cost-benefit of turning “dirty” shipping clean
What do you value more – stopping climate chaos or keeping global shipping cheap? That was the dilemma many developing countries faced at the wood-panelled London headquarters of…
Economic diplomacy: Power shifts with Jakarta
Trading places
It’s now half a century since Australia and Indonesia signed a bilateral investment agreement leading to serial government initiatives mostly on the Australian…
Reforming Australia’s trading system – a long hard slog but worth the effort
As Australia seeks to diversify its economy, build more resilience into supply chains, and improve productivity, reducing the transaction costs of both exporting and importing has…
Globalisation promised growth. Now emerging economies need a new path
The global economy is now entering a more dangerous phase of “selective” de-globalisation. Escalating geopolitical tensions have spilled over to the once “secular” arena of trade…
Trading up can unlock India’s industrial potential
Since India moved away from its socialist economy in 1991, it has had many transformative successes, but its biggest failure continues to be the absence of a robust manufacturing…
“Play defence” in any collective response to China’s economic coercion
Many Western governments consider Beijing’s frequent use of economic sanctions a “clear and present danger” to the global economy which erodes the rules-based order. Canberra…
Economic diplomacy: Friends, rivals and diplomatic gaslighting
Hitting the gas
Japan’s ambassador to Australia Shingo Yamagami made himself an unexpectedly public figure in the reserved Canberra diplomatic corps with his witty social media…
Economic diplomacy: Arming up for war and trade
Guns AND butter
It took a Second World War general-turned-president in Dwight Eisenhower to provide one of the most evocative articulations of the classic government spending…