Harnessing Digital Trade for Competitiveness and Development

An entrepreneur in Serbia who opened an online portal for selling cattle. The Kenyan founder of an online crafts marketplace that works with artisans who have no bank accounts or computers. The CEO of a software services provider in Nepal. These are some of the speakers who will join this conference to discuss how the emerging phenomenon of digital trade can help developing countries, and how it has already succeeded in boosting the reach of small-scale entrepreneurs. An increasing number of producers in developing countries are selling their wares on the Internet, either through their own websites or through web portals such as eBay and Alibaba. This strategy dramatically reduces costs for small entrepreneurs. But firms in developing countries face significant impediments to fully exploiting the Internet for exporting – from infrastructure weaknesses to unreliable payments. This conference will bring together entrepreneurs, policy experts, and development practitioners to brainstorm ways that the World Bank Group and other stakeholders can work together to break down these barriers.

OVERVIEW
AGENDA
MATERIALS
PARTNERS

Conference participants will discuss policy-oriented and empirical work that illustrates the opportunities that digital trade is opening up for developing economies – particularly for SMEs. They will also address the remaining impediments to the use of digital trade in promoting economic growth in developing countries and boosting prosperity for the world's poorest. The conference will address the following issues:

1. Global trends in e-commerce and e-trade; data sources and methods.

2. E-literacy: building economic capabilities at the firm and national level using digital technologies.

3. Policy issues that affect the expansion of digital trade.

4. The impact of logistics and trade facilitation on digital trade.

5. Digital trade and trade agreements.

READ
Digitizing livestock trading: an interview with Milos Milic
Our panelist Milos Milic, co-founder and CEO of Farmia in Serbia, answers a few questions on how a digital platform can
transform the way livestock is traded.

WATCH
From Slums to Cocktail Parties - African Jewelry is Trending
Our panelist Catherine Mahugu is the founder of Shop Soko, a Kenyan startup, has used mobile technology to link local artisans
with global markets. This video goes behind the scenes of her company that distributes some of Africa's coolest fashion items
via Internet.

8:00-8:30	Registration and Continental Breakfast
8:30-9:00	Welcome – Anabel González, Senior Director, Trade & Competitiveness Global Practice, World Bank Group
9:00-9:30	Keynote: Michael Kende, Chief Economist, Internet Society
9:30-11:00	Global Trends in e-Commerce and e-Trade; Data Sources and Methods Moderator: Michael Ferrantino, Lead Economist, Trade & Competitiveness Global Practice, World Bank Group Shawn Tan, World Bank Group, a member of the World Development Report 2016, “Internet for Development” David Riker, U.S. International Trade Commission, lead economist for USITC’s Digital Trade studies
11:00-11:15	Coffee
11:15-12:45	Strategies for Facilitating Digital Trade at the National and Firm Level Moderator: Maja Andjelkovic, infoDev/Trade & Competitiveness Global Practice, or Tim Kelly, Lead ICT Specialist, Transport & ICT Global Practice, World Bank Dr. Venancio Massingue, Founder and CEO of SIITRI, former Minister of Science and Technology Mozambique Catherine Mahugu, Founder, Shop Soko, Kenya Milos Milic, Co-Founder and CEO, Farmia, Serbia
12:45-1:45	Lunch Break
1:45-3:15	The Enabling Environment for Digital Trade Moderator: Kati Suominen, Adjunct Professor at UCLA Anderson School of Management, Adjunct Fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), Founder & CEO of TradeUp, LLC, and Founder & CEO of Nextrade Group, LLC. Bitange Ndemo, University of Nairobi Business School, former Permanent Secretary of Kenya’s Ministry of Information and Communication Michael Minges, ictDATA.org Bibhusan Bista, CEO, Young Innovations, Nepal
3:15-3:30	Coffee
3:30-5:00	Digital Trade and Trade Agreements Moderator: Usman Ahmed, Policy Counsel, Public Policy Lab, eBay Inc. Anupam Chander, Law Professor at UC-Davis – author of the Electronic Silk Road Hosuk Lee-Makiyama ECIPE – European Center for Intellectiual Political Economy – one of the four authors of a report on the costs of data localization Sacha Wunsch-Vincent, Senior Economic Officer in the Office of the Chief Economist of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) – papers

Trade Governance in the Digital Age

Thomas Cottier, Mira Burri, Anupam Chander, Christian Tietje, and Amy Porges, Cambridge University Press, 2012

Report
Trade 2.0

Anupam Chander, Yale Journal of International Law, 34 (2009): 281

Article
Assessment of the impact of Internet Exchange Points (IXPs) – empirical study of Kenya and Nigeria

Michael Kende and Charles Hurpy, Internet Society (2012): 1-12

Article
Lifting barriers to Internet development in Africa: suggestions for improving connectivity

Robert Schumann and Michael Kende, Analysys Manson Limited, Report for the Internet Society (2013): 37

Article
The Costs of Data Localisation: A Friendly Fire on Economic Recovery

Matthias Bauer, Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, Erik van der Marel, and Bert Verschelde, ECIPE Occasional Paper, No. 3/2014

Paper
Future-Proofing World Trade in Technology: Turning the WTO IT Agreement (ITA) into the International Digital Economy Agreement (IDEA)

Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, Aussenwirtschaft 66, no. 3 (2011): 279

Article
Can Online Markets Make Trade More Inclusive?

Andreas Lendle and Marcelo Olarreaga, Inter-American Development Bank, 2014
eBay’s anatomy

Marcelo Olarreaga, Andréas Lendle, Pierre-Louis Vezina, and Simon Schropp, Economics Letters 121 (2013): 115-120

Article
There goes gravity: how eBay reduces trade costs

Andreas Lendle, Marcelo Olarreaga, Simon Schropp, and Pierre-Louis Vézina, World Bank Working Paper WPS6253 (2012/10)

Working paper
Digital Trade in the U.S. and Global Economies, Part 1

Inv. No. 332-531, USITC publication 4415, July 2013

PDF 4.52MB
Digital Trade in the U.S. and Global Economies, Part 2

Inv. No. 332-540, USITC publication 4485, August 2014

PDF 7.15MB
Tracking ICTs: world summit on the information society targets

Michael Minges, Information and Communications for Development: Global Trends and Policies (2006): 125-146

Article
Globalization 4.0

By Kati Suominen

Blog
Aid for eTrade: Accelerating the Global eCommerce Revolution

By Dr. Kati Suominen, Adjunct Fellow, CSIS Europe Program, November 2014

PDF 922KB
Online Trade, Offline Rules: A Review of Barriers to e-commerce in the EU

National Board of Trade, 2015

Report
No Transfer, No Production – a Report on Cross-border Data Transfers, Global Value Chains, and the Production of Goods

National Board of Trade, 2015

Report
Information Economy Report 2015 - Unlocking the Potential of E-commerce for Developing Countries

UNCTAD, 2015

Report
2015 US Small Business Global Growth Report

eBay Public Policy Lab, 2015

PDF 394KB
Regulating e-commerce through international policy: Understanding the international trade law issues of e-commerce

Brian Bieron and Usman Ahmed, Journal of World Trade 46, no. 3 (2012): 545-570

Article

Where: Room MC 13-121, The World Bank, 1818 H St. NW, Washington, DC
When: 8am - 5pm, May 19, 2015
WebEx meeting number: 730 216 801
WebEx password: JAgsmZ72

Trade