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APEC Currents June 2018
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Appointment of New Director
The Australian APEC Study Centre
The APEC Study Centre is delighted to announce the appointment of its new Director, Professor Andrew MacIntyre,Deputy Vice-Chancellor Global Development and Vice-President at RMIT University. Professor MacIntyre replaces Mr Ken Waller who has retired from the position.

Professor MacIntyre has long been engaged with global issues. In his Deputy Vice Chancellor role, he is responsible for global development strategies, with specific responsibilities for overseeing RMIT Vietnam and RMIT Europe​.

Prior to joining RMIT, he was Professor of Political Science at the Australian National University, where he also served as Dean of the College and Director of the Research School of Asia & the Pacific (2008-2014), and earlier founding Director of the Crawford School of Public Policy (2002-2009). Earlier in his career, he was also Professor at the Graduate School of International Relations & Pacific Studies at the University of California, San Diego.

Professor MacIntyre is a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia and has served on the editorial committees of an array of scholarly journals. He has published widely on Southeast Asian politics, international relations in the Asia-Pacific region and, more recently, enhancing universities. He was the founder of the Australia-Indonesia Governance Research Partnership, and serves on the International Advisory Board of the Bulletin of Indonesian Economic Studies. He is the recipient of the Japanese Foreign Minister's Commendation for contributions to the promotion of relations between Japan and Australia (2006) and also a recipient of the Presidential Friends of Indonesia award (2010).

Professor MacIntyre serves on the board of directors of the Asia Foundation – Australia, and is Deputy Chair of the Australian Committee for Pacific Economic Cooperation (AusPECC). He has previously served as a director of the Australian-American Leadership Dialogue and as a consultant to government institutions and companies in Australia, the United States and China, as well as international agencies such as the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank and the ASEAN Secretariat of the Asia Foundation (Australia), the Advisory Council of the Asia Society (Australia) and is Deputy Chair of the Australian Committee.

Guiding frameworks for regulation of digital trade in
services


By Kristen Bondietti
Principal Consultant Services, The Australian APEC Study Centre
The importance of digital trade to APEC economies is now recognised. Developing an enabling environment for digital trade is emerging as a core part of APEC’s plans to improve the competitiveness of services and trade in services in the region. This is the first in a series of policy briefs by the ASC, designed to raise awareness and promote discussion in APEC circles on this issue.  In this brief: Provisions in new trade agreements promote rules for the free flow of information and services. They can serve as reference points to develop regulatory and policy frameworks for more open digital trade. APEC is an important platform for building policy coordination and consensus within and between governments to support this…[READ MORE]
 

Where to with APEC's investment framework?

By Ken Waller
Former Director the Australian APEC Study Centre, RMIT University, Executive Director, APEC 2018 and Director, PNG ABAC Secretariat
The Bogor goals established the concept of free and open investment across the APEC region by 2020 as a crucial aspect of regional economic integration.    Since the inception of APEC, FDI flows have grown strongly but more recently, and particularly since the Global Financial Crisis, growth has stalled. AS APEC considers its 2020 Vision and its approach to ‘next generation trade and investment issues’, a central issue under consideration is how promote an environment in the region that encourages cross-border investment flows.  Ken Waller outlines some key considerations that need to be part of any approach to improve the investment climate… [READ MORE]
 
The New Trade Agenda, Mutual Recognition and BREXIT

By Don Kenyon

Associate Professor and Visiting Fellow at the Centre for European Studies, The Australian National University
and
Pierre van der Eng
Associate Professor in the College of Business and Economics, The Australian National University
Now that import tariffs no longer dictate trade flows, it is imperative that the world embraces a ‘New Trade Agenda’ that reduces the trade-reducing effects of diverging domestic policies. These include national regulatory requirements such as product standards on goods, certification, licensing procedures on goods and services and professional qualifications on traded services. Don Kenyon and Pierre Van der Eng argue that the UK’s BREXIT negotiating position seeking a Mutual Recognition approach to UK Europe regulations could achieve liberalisation of the trade-restrictive effect of regulatory divergences in the forthcoming Australia-EU FTA negotiations. [READ MORE]
 
Global value chains in the Asia-Pacific

By John West
Adjunct Professor at Tokyo's Sophia University, Contributing Editor at FDI-Intelligence, a Financial Times magazine, and Executive Director of the Asian Century Institute
Author of “Asian Century… on a Knife-edge: A 360 Degree Analysis of Asia’s Recent Economic Development”.
 
Global Value Chains (GVCs) are driven by multinational enterprises which have invested and established production facilities in Asia's emerging economies, notably China, Malaysia and Thailand.  Participation in these GVCs has boosted economic growth, poverty reduction, and prosperity in these economies. But a close examination indicates that there is much that Asian governments could do to get better value out of GVCs.  Multilateral trade and investment liberalisation offers a path towards greater participation in GVCs.  The recently agreed TPP-11 (Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership) is a very important initiative in this regard, covering issues which are relevant to GVCs like investment, services, intellectual property, and cross-border data flows for service suppliers and investors.  Author John West argues that to facilitate other countries climbing GVCs attention must be given to infrastructure, and the TPP-11 expanded to include other economies….[READ MORE]
 
 
Supply Chains on Blockchains

By Christopher Berg, Senior Research Fellow, Professor Sinclair Davidson and Associate Professor Jason Potts
Blockchain Innovation Hub, RMIT University
Blockchain technology is shaping up as one of the most disruptive new technologies of the 21st century, facilitating an entirely new decentralised architecture of economic organization. While still experimental, it is disrupting industry after industry, beginning with money, banking and payments, and now moving through finance, logistics, health, and across the digital economy. We need to start thinking about how we want free trade to evolve in the blockchain era….[READ MORE]
 
 
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The Australian APEC Study Centre · RMIT University, Building 69, 50 Cardigan St Carlton VIC 3053 · Melbourne, Vic 3000 · Australia