What is in this article?:
- Trade Statistics Inflate China's Surplus with US, Claim WTO and OECD
- Traditional Measures Drive Misguided Decisions
The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the World Trade Organization unveiled a new database that seeks to measure the value-added in trade.
Traditional Measures Drive Misguided Decisions
With production chains becoming increasingly globalized, the OECD and WTO cautioned that "traditional measures of trade..., alone, may lead to misguided decisions being taken" in trade policy.
"Blocking imports will damage a country own productivity growth and automatically damage its competitiveness," said OECD Chief Angel Guria.
The OECD-WTO calculations showed, for example, that a third of the value of the cars that Germany's powerhouse car industry exports is generated in other countries.
"If Germany would say 'no imports,' well, no export of cars!" said Guria.
WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy said "Countries that export more and best are the countries that import more and best."
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2013
