Obstacles to Western Balkan Trade in Services?
event
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Date
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Wednesday, 12 October 2011
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Venue
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Thai Theatre, New Academic Building, LSE
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Speakers
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Dr Borko Handjiski, Economist at the World Bank
Dr Ivana Prica, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Economics, University of Belgrade
Dr Peter Sanfey, Lead Economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)
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Chair
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Dr Vassilis Monastiriotis, Senior Lecturer in the Political Economy of South Eastern Europe, LSE
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In October 2011 LSEE organised a panel debate on the subtle but increasingly important issue of Trade in Services in the Western Balkans. We had the pleasure to welcome from Washington DC Dr Borko Handjiski, Economist at the World Bank and author of a number of reports and studies on Regional Trade in South East Europe, who was joined in the panel by Dr Peter Sanfey, Lead Economist at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), and Dr Ivana Prica, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Economics, University of Belgrade.
The debate kicked-off with a short presentation on the recent World Bank study on ‘Barriers to trade in services in the CEFTA region’, a study that forcefully calls for deeper trade integration in the region and further liberalisation in the Trade in Services. The presentations by Peter Sanfey and Ivana Prica partly responded to this, but also added further dimensions to the issue. Peter Sanfey’s presentation looked more at the role that trade integration more generally can play for economic recovery and growth, especially after the global and Eurozone crisis. In turn, Ivana Prica looked more specifically at the domestic level and highlighted a number of challenges to trade integration and market liberalisation in the region as well as the potential social and economic costs that may be associated to these processes.
An interested debate followed with students and academic experts from the audience.