Trade in natural resources and the WTO

Yves here. Most readers probably know James Kwak well from the Baseline Scenario blog and the book he co-authored with Simon Johnson, 13 Bankers. The interview covers a wide range of topics, and produces a compendium of slightly left-leaning conventional wisdom (albeit with some clever framing). By James Stafford, editor of OilPrice. Cross posted from OilPrice

“It means a lot of wealth for them, so they are going to spend a lot of money on an issue that’s fairly narrow in the minds of most Americans” Exxon Mobil Corp. and Dow Chemical Co., big-dollar lobbying allies on many issues in Washington, are on opposite sides of a high-stakes fight over how much of rising U.S. natural gas supplies should be sold overseas.

Last night, I lamented the last four years of politics-driven US trade policy stagnation and the United States' abdication of its traditional role as the world's global trade leader.  My longwinded essay was admittedly light on links and examples, but did happen to finger Canada as one of several countries that have left the United States in the trade liberalization/leadership dust over the last few years.

Céline Carrère, Julien Gourdon, Marcelo Olarreaga, 15 May 2012Regional integration schemes that include natural-resource-abundant countries have by and large been unsuccessful. Part of the reason is the uneven distribution of gains when resource-poor and resource-rich countries integrate.

Charles K. Ebinger, director of the Brookings Institution's Energy Security Initiative, writing the L.A. Times:

Kurt Wulff (McDep Associates) submits: Canada offers some of the world’s most accessible, large scale resource opportunities that investors can capture in two pure play buy recommendations – Encana (ECA) in natural gas and Canadian Oil Sands Trust (

BRUSSELS — Canada threatened on Wednesday to take the European Union to the World Trade Organisation over its plans to label Canadian oil sands as dirty, but promised not to delay a bilateral trade pact. The issue has overshadowed relations as Canada and the EU try to deepen economic ties through a trade deal that could generate US$28-billion a year in new business and commerce.

Thorvaldur Gylfason, Per Magnus Wijkman, 13 November 2010Since discovering oil in 1990, Equatorial Guinea has experienced massive growth that multiplied its GDP per capita many times over. But its oil wealth has not improved the well being of most of its inhabitants. This column argues that such resources belong to the citizenry under international law, and unelected governments that expropriate natural wealth are violating human rights.Full Article: Trade in loot