Since 2002 RBW has been researching and monitoring the intersection between trade and financial policies. While it directed its initial inquiries into the “policy coherence” agenda of international financial and trade institutions its efforts have gradually evolved into a more sophisticated and bottom-up approach to understand the linkages between trade and finance at global, regional and local levels.

In the context of such efforts RBW founded the International Working Group on Trade-Finance Linkages. The mission of the Working Group is to bring together organizations North and South to promote trade and finance policies on the basis of a paradigm that links such policies in the service of development premised on human rights, gender equality, social justice and ecological goals.

The objectives pursued by the group are to:

1. Support the capacity of civil society organizations to understand the connections between trade and finance in ways that effectively serve their contextual advocacy agendas.
2. Build a common advocacy platform to link trade and financial policies in ways that support greater autonomy for local and national constituencies and governments to develop and implement their own policies
3. Expand an informed community of activists, researchers, academics and policy-makers which can, in turn, raise awareness among the general public, grassroots and social movements in support of concerted and sustained efforts that achieve the aforementioned objectives.

The Working Group now brings together over 350 organizations from both trade and financial background, North and South. It is steered by a Volunteer Steering Committee which meets every 2-3 months via conference calls and is, at this point, flexible and open to anybody from the larger working group willing to volunteer extra time to take part on it. However, deliberate efforts went into ensuring the constitution and involvement of Southern regional platforms that could provide an organic and sustained input into the direction and leadership of the Working Group, through their own deliberations and participation in the Steering Committee.

For more information, to sign up for the listserv and/ or join the calls please e-mail aldo@coc.org.

RBW also has provided extensive capacity-building to governments, civil society organizations and grassroots, as well as fostered dialogue and reflection on these issues by a broad range of stakeholders.

Recent Articles

• Bank practices, more than Basel II itself, responsible for trade finance decline (January 2010)
• Financial Crisis and Trade: Informal Seminar for World Bank/ IMF Executive Directors (March 2010)
• Financial Crisis and Trade: Consultation with Latin American/ Caribbean officials (November 2009)
• FSA’s new paper fuels debate on global banks and trade (November 2009)
• IMF backtracks on constraints to trade-led development –but how much? (October 2009)
• RBW testifies at hearings on global financial crisis (September 2009)
• Financial Crisis and Trade: Consultation with Asian Government Officials (August 2009)
• Can the G20 have it both ways? (September 2009)
• Big banks good for global trade, says BIS (September 2009)
• FFD Follow up new modalities, agreed at ECOSOC (July 2009)
• Book: Trade-Finance Linkages for Promoting Development (August 2009)
• Is a good investment climate relevant to development in Africa? (July 2009)
• IMF Work on Trade Evaluation to be presented (July 2009)
• Export led growth: is the Financial Crisis Revealing its Limits? (June 2009)
• Bringing trade into financial and monetary reform (June 2009)
• Financial Crisis and Trade-Finance Linkages - Statement (May 2009)
• Investment agreements blocking sovereign debt restructuring measures, says study (May 2009)
• Financial Crisis and Trade: Consultation with African Finance Ministers (April 2009)
• Stiglitz Commission finds lack of trade-finance coherence (March 2009)
• Rules liberalizing financial services, an obstacle to anti-crisis efforts (March 2009)
• Tax justice and trade: RBW authors book chapter (February 2009)
• Trade dimensions of financial system should be factored into proposals to reform it, say CSOs (February 2009)
• Interdependence in trade, debt and finance recognized in 'Stiglitz Commission' terms of reference (February 2009)
• Holistic development a casualty in Doha Review Conference on Financing for Development (December 2008)
• Towards a Holistic Review of Debt, Trade and Finance- Side Event at Doha Conference (December 2008)
• FFD more relevant to developing countries' trade than the Doha Trade Round, says COC (November 2008)
• Trade Issues Crucial for Effectively Dealing with the Global Financial Crisis (November 2008)
• Review of IMF Work on Trade: is the IEO listening ? (November 2008)
• WTO vies for role in shaping “Bretton Woods II” (October 2008)
• Interpreting outcome of WTO talks no easy task for FFD negotiations (October 2008)
• Civil society to meet with team evaluating IMF work on Trade (October 2008)
• Trade-Finance Linkages as Cross-cutting Issue in Doha FFD Review, submitted to Co-Facilitators (July 2008)
• CSOs submit joint NGO statement on Trade Review Session of Financing for Development (June 2008)
• Presentation at ECLAC Conference explores trade-finance linkages as a systemic issue (June 2008)
• RBW submits inputs into evaluation of IMF role on trade (June 2008)
• International Policy Aspects of Food Price Inflation: Some Remarks (June 2008)
• Can the Doha Review Conference make trade an engine for development? (April 2008)
• Civil Society Perspectives on Aid for Trade: Book Chapter (December 2007)
• Civil society concerns voiced at Global Aid for Trade Review (November 2007)
• Doing Business Report 2008: with power comes ir-responsibility? (November 2007)
• Closing all Paths to Trade-led Development? The IMF Revises Guiding Principles on Surveillance. (August 2007)
• Globalization bad for workers (but not too much...) finds IMF (June 2007)
• The Fiscal Impacts of Trade Liberalization. Remarks delivered at Seminar on Fiscal Policy in Latin America (March 2007)
• World Bank to bypass restrictions in lending for infrastructure to Sub-National entities (May 2006)
• The European Commission's position on ""Review Clauses"": Any Hope Left on Aid for Trade? (February 2007)
• Regional Strategy Seminar on Finance-Trade Linkages - Asia (June 2006)
• Is the Doha Agenda Moving Away from Development? (April 2006)
• If trade openness is not an automatic good then World Bank report can be assessed in a novel way (March 2006)
• Poor Not Benefitting from World Bank Trade Policies
• Aid For Trade Raises Concerns: Choosing between a Development Round and a Development Face (March 2006)
• NGOs ready to flex new muscles at world trade talks (November 2005)
• NGO Principles on ""Aid for Trade"" (December 2005)
• Developing countries are right to be cynical (October 2005)
• Debt and Trade: Time to Make the Connections (2004)
• CAFTA Rules on Sovereign Debt: Cementing the Chains of Debt (May 2005)
• The Debt - Trade Connection in Debt Management Initiatives. The Need for a Change in Paradigm (2004)
• World Bank's response to sign-on letter on the Bank's trade policies
• WTO General Council Meeting on Coherence: Highlights (October 2004)
• Trade Liberalization and the Role of International Financial Institutions (November 2004)
• Letter to World Bank President regarding World Bank's interference in trade negotiations (September 2004)
• Capacity of International Financial Institutions to Support Trade in Low-income Countries (September 2004)
• Trade Policies and Development: What Role for the Bretton Woods Institutions? (April 2004)
• Some Selected Issues in the Coherence Agenda of the WTO and the BWIs (2003)
• Coherence in Global Economic Policy-Making: A CSO Assessment (Spring 2003)
• Civil Society Statement on Policy Coherence (Signed by 40 Networks and NGOs) (April 2003)
• Coherence Between Trade and Financial Policies: Summary of Issues and Agenda (September 2002)
• Financing For Development: Disappointment, Hope, and Many Questions (2002)