World Trade Organization

Author Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala poses for the camera in a dark blue outfit

WTO head Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on vaccines: ‘We have to solve the health crisis if we want economic recovery’

Leaders

Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, the first African and female director-general of the World Trade Organization, talks to The World about her work priorities and her recent book, “Women and Leadership: Real Lives, Real Lessons.”

A bottle of whisky is left on a bank.

Trump hails ‘nice victory’ on trade as EU whisky, wine makers left reeling

A worker walks past piles of plastic PET bottles at Asia's largest PET plastic recycling factory

The US wants China to reverse its decision to bar foreign garbage

Global Politics
A worker monitors molten iron pouring into a furnace at steel manufacturing plant in Hefei, Anhui province, China.

Trump defiant after criticism of steel and aluminum tariffs

Economics
India solar charging station

A US trade complaint may hinder India’s plan for a homegrown solar industry

Environment
The World

The Sleeping Bag Tax

Sleeping bags from Bangladesh were competing with a manufacturer in Alabama, and a senator from that state didn’t like it.

WTO Aftermath Roundtable

As the dust settles in Seattle, host Steve Curwood talks with Carl Pope, executive director of the Sierra Club, and Jonathan Adler, with the Competitive Enterprise Institute, about the significance of the protests and the future of world trade.

World Trade Summit: Pearls of a Global Economy

Living On Earth’s political server Mark Hertsgaard joins host Steve Curwood to provide some background on the World Trade Organization and the free-trade agenda for its upcoming summit later this month. They discuss why environmentalists are concerned about trade agreements.

Gatt and the Environment

Steve talks with professor Arpad von Lazar, of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, about the likely impact of the GATT ruling and the possibility of redrawing the 40 year-old agreement to include environmental issues.

The World

Gatt Fight

Rebecca Davis reports on a ruling by a panel of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade against a US ban on the importation of dolphin-“unfriendly” tuna. Mexico had challenged the ban as a form of protectionism. Some environmentalists worry that the ruling threatens to undermine a host of other international environmental initiatives.