Panelists at this session focused on the recent developments on measuring trade in value added, global value chains (GVCs) and their relevance to developing countries.
Summary text prepared by the lead organizers of the session: International Working Group on Trade-Finance Linkages and Third World Network. The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of UNCTAD. |
Civil society organizations as well as UNCTAD have long brought to attention the phenomenon that many developing countries, after implementing trade reforms and improving their export performances, still failed to see the results in growth and financing for development.
The link between trade and increased financing being captured at the national level is, therefore, a crucial one and participants welcomed the work of the World Trade Organization and others to develop statistics on trade in value added.
Participants also recognized that there are huge methodological and even data collection obstacles to produce this data in a suitable format. Once this data is available, however, it will be a crucial input for evaluating whether insertion in global value chain is a good strategy for developing countries to increase their value added.
In the meantime, advice on global value chains is based on anecdotal evidence as well as theoretical insights based on which panelists had different degrees of optimism and pessimism. Some considered that the ability of countries to benefit from GVCs depended on whether they had prospects of moving upwards in the chain.
Given that the highest value segments were those where lead companies extracted rents based on monopolistic or oligopolistic positions of market power, there was little room to be hopeful. Issues of power and vulnerability were critical factors to address if small and medium companies were to benefit.
Others considered, on the contrary, that there is room to be optimistic about the impacts that value chain insertion will have on the growth and value addition capacities of developing countries and that some data might understate the amount of value addition provided by domestic companies.
Speakers:
- Mr. Aldo Caliari, Director, Rethinking Bretton Woods Project, Washington D.C.
- Mr. James Zhan, Director, Division on Investment and Enterprise, UNCTAD
- Ms. Christina Chang, Economic Analyst, Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, London
- Mr. Michael Roberts, Aid for Trade Coordinator, WTO, Geneva
