'Digital, Green and Open? Global Trade Policy at a Crossroads' : Recap of the 2021 World Trade Forum

This year's Forum focused on lessons and implications of trade policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, research on digital and trade dimensions of programs to green the economy, EU external policies and prospects for plurilateral cooperation under the umbrella of the WTO.

The World Trade Forum is jointly organised by the World Trade Institute (WTI) and the European University Institute (EUI) in Florence. Prof. Joseph Francois, Managing Director of the WTI and Bernard Hoekman, Professor and Programme Director Global Economics at the Robert Schuman Center for Advanced Studies of the EUI, opened the forum.

A total of three plenary sessions and three research session were held on both days of the conference. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and related space constraints, the usual structure of several parallel sessions at the same time was not possible. All sessions were live-streamed on YouTube (links below).

Every year, a book related to the World Trade Forum is published with Cambridge University Press. For 2021, the book project is managed by Henry Gao (Singapore Management University), Damian Raess (WTI) and Ka Zeng (University of Arkansas). The book project this year will organize parallel sessions in November on the topic “China and the WTO”.

Next year, the WTI will be hosting the Forum. For more information about the World Trade Forum in general and this year's edition, please click on the links below.