Word: trades
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...Realistically, it could take many years to form an E.U.-style trading bloc in the region - if such a body can be formed at all. Historical enmities simmering between nations like China and Japan could make close cooperation impossible, as could divergent economic interests of poor developing countries like Vietnam and those of advancing industrial economies like South Korea. Another commonly cited impediment is cultural diversity. "Europe is in a sense a single civilization; Asia is not," says Ravi Menon, Permanent Secretary of Singapore's Ministry of Trade and Industry. Others question whether Asia's institutions are robust enough...
...save to protect themselves." In other words, making it easier for other Asian countries to access China's market isn't the same as convincing Chinese consumers to spend more. "The Chinese remind everyone it will take a long time," says Menon of Singapore's Ministry of Trade and Industry. According to Citigroup, China will indeed become the world's largest retail market - by 2030. That's a lengthy wait for some of benefits of an Asian trading bloc to accrue...
...Still, pressure for reductions in regional trade barriers is building, partly due to frustration over the failure of the World Trade Organization to complete the Doha Development Round, which is supposed to lower trade barriers globally. Leaders at the upcoming APEC summit are expected to commit to the completion of a basic framework for an Asia-Pacific zone by the end of 2010. While the details have yet to be hammered out, such an agreement would be an unprecedented step forward. One thing is for certain: this year's APEC must generate more than an amusing photo...
...problem is that after a decade of strong growth in China in particular, we now have an unbalanced system in which the dollar is overvalued against the Chinese yuan (among other emerging-market currencies). That has contributed to big U.S. trade deficits and, as China built up a huge stash of dollars it needed to put somewhere, to the credit bubble that precipitated the financial crisis. There's widespread agreement that this setup has to change but little agreement about how to change it. Which is a risky situation...
...climate change with Our Choice, a sequel to his 2006 slideshow-book-film, An Inconvenient Truth. Our Choice discusses the causes of global warming (fossil fuels, deforestation), viable solutions (renewable energy) and ways to make these solutions a reality (a CO[subscript 2] tax and a cap-and-trade system). It's packed with scientific data explained in painstaking detail--including a full-page graphic on how a wind turbine works--but it reads like a homework assignment. Gore's excellent lessons--why biofuel isn't as environmentally friendly as you'd think; why large-scale, sustainable changes...