Courtesy: friendsofeurope/flickr
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang’s visit to India is likely to include an empty shopping basket of opportunities that keep domestic Chinese consumers content. Mr. Li should encourage Indian companies to fill that Chinese consumer need, and additional concessions may, if handled correctly by India, be sought as a result.
This daily column includes Gateway House’s Badi Soch – big thought – of the day’s foreign policy events. Today’s focus is on Platts which is under investigation by the EU for allegedly manipulating crude oil prices.
Pakistan’s national elections will take place in the backdrop of a troubled economy, severe energy crisis, and frequent terrorist attacks. Can these problems be solved if the next leadership agrees to open its territories for trade and transit purposes between India and Afghanistan?
Currently, India is clinging to the fall in energy and gold prices to solve the problems of a rising current account deficit and inflation. Can it, however, afford to get complacent and assume that the vulnerabilities are resolved?
Even though global climate cooperation has collapsed, the need for climate-change action still persists. Can changes in the World Trade Organization trade rules facilitate climate-change action and technological advances without damaging trade?
The collective GDP of countries in sub-Saharan Africa has grown at an average of 5% per annum since 2000, and is expected to grow faster in the future. Will the recent political reforms give the region a chance to sustain this boom in the coming years?
Following the 2008 mortgage crash, the U.S. Federal Reserve Board implemented a quantitative easing policy – to stabilise the banks, and rejuvenate the economic environment. Although this strategy has brought some respite, it has done so without creating many new jobs for Americans.
Subsequent to the global financial crises of 2007, while several countries were still struggling with economic problems, Latvia managed to dramatically decrease its public debt, and its GDP too grew at an impressive pace. How was this success achieved and at what cost to the people of the country?
Indian foreign policy has not yet addressed the ramifications of Chinese economic dominance in BRICS. Nor have we matched China’s engagement within the group to ensure that the BRICS vision of a new international order for emerging economies actually works in their favour.
The BRICS Bank, which was ratified at the 5th BRICS Summit at Durban, South Africa, must include the incubation of new public service delivery models in its mandate and simultaneously encourage the sharing of best practices across the developing world.
