Trade in Europe & CIS

Trade

UNDP Activities on Trade

UNDP is involved in a range of activities on trade-related issues. In particular, it focuses on trade negotiations as part of MDG 8 and capacity development. Current activities at global, regional and national levels include:

- Advocacy on the linkages between trade, human development and the MDGs through MDG country reports; policy-oriented studies and discussions at the national level, encompassing government officials, parliamentarians and stakeholders from civil society and the private sector; and analytical work to improve the trade negotiating position of poor countries;

- Incorporating human development concerns into the Integrated Framework and in other country-level trade capacity development interventions, including strengthening linkages between national poverty reduction plans and PRSPs and pro-poor trade policies; and facilitating donor coordination and East-East cooperation on trade-related issues;

- Establishment of a corporate database as a tool for knowledge-sharing on trade capacity development experiences. The poverty and MDG knowledge networks provide a platform for discussion of pro-poor issues, of which trade is a subset.

UNDP RBEC

The UNDP seeks to help governments, civil society and research institutes to build their capacity to assess the impact of the various trade agreements, including WTO, and how to structure policies that will mitigate the negative effects caused by a trade agreement, while fostering the growth of a robust SME sector.

The UNDP organizes seminars, conferences and round tables to raise awareness of these issues among government officials, civil society actors and donors. Moreover UNDP assists the trade-related researches of economic policy institutes by Economic Policy Research Institutes Network (EPIN), which may considerably improve the policy-making and analysis capacity in the region soon.