In The News

‘Food Should Be Left Off the Free Trade Table’

April 6, 2005
Many economists believe that trade liberalization is the main driving force that created today's dynamic international market. The increasing exchange of goods and services produced and sold around the world have far-reaching implications for different localities – for better and for worse. One important area of world trade concerning this local and global relationship is agriculture, which...

China's African Safari

Paul Mooney January 3, 2005
Since the 1960s, China has been rather consistent in offering assistance to African countries in agriculture, heavy industries, and infrastructure development. In recent years, Sino-African trade has enjoyed particularly rapid growth. As Paul Mooney reports, many African leaders, regarding China as a reliable friend who has suffered the similar imperialist aggression by Western powers, welcome...

A Thaw in South Asia? – Part II

Huma Fakhar December 27, 2004
Improved relations between South Asia's two most prominent states, India and Pakistan, are crucial to the region's ascending global profile, write Huma Fakhar and Jean-Pierre Lehmann. Encouraging diplomatic developments have diluted some of the hostile sentiments of shared by the two countries, which were once on a path to nuclear war. If intra-regional trade would heat up, as well,...

Turkey's Muslim Identity Did Not Prevent Turkey's Intense Relations with Europe

Abdullah Gil December 16, 2004
The debate surrounding Turkey's inclusion as a member of the European Union has prompted a process of political and economic reform that has been remarkably successful and has received widespread popular support. Turkey's Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul writes that his country has demonstrated a commitment to internal restructuring merits recognition by the European and global community....

A Rampaging Market, but a Long Way from Global Power

Isabel Hilton November 13, 2004
Many observers in the West have in recent years greeted China's steamrolling economic growth with unabashed optimism and glee. Yet amidst predictions of imminent superpower-dom, China faces stark internal inequalities that threaten to derail its lofty aspirations. While much of its urban population enjoys the material advantages and growing freedoms of recent reforms, 900 million people...

A Grim Report on Future Grabs Europe's Attention

Graham Bowley November 12, 2004
The economies of the European Union have been struggling, and according to a former Dutch Prime Minister, the situation will only get worse. According to data from the International Monetary Fund, over the past 10 years, US growth has averaged about 3.3 percent a year, compared to only 2.1 percent for the EU. To make matters worse, Europe simultaneously faces rising life expectancies and...

Multilingual Broadcasting Gives Support to All Disaster Survivors

Eriko Arita November 4, 2004
Local government authorities in northern Japan are rushing to minimize damage in the aftermath of last Thursday’s magnitude 5.7 earthquake. Easing recovery for Japanese residents is not their only concern: Multilingual broadcasting of emergency information is the latest development for accommodating a growing population of foreign residents. Particularly in metropolitan areas, new efforts...