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Students should be able to explain the benefits of international trade, including:
a) increased competition
b) lower prices
c) greater choice
d) acquisition of resources
e) more foreign exchange earnings
f) access to larger markets
g) economies of scale
h) more efficient resource allocation
i) more efficient production

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Go find credible news quotes and/or references that allow you to explain the benefits of trade listed above.

Explicit and implicit

One good starting point may be my twitter feed; @mrmatthewkelly #trade

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Brits could turn back to cheddar if the price of French cheese shoots up after a no-deal Brexit.

Tesco's chair John Allan told the BBC that import taxes could push up the price of brie by as much as 40%.

He said it might "change the mix of what people eat", leading to people buying more British cheddar.

He added food bills could climb by 5% on average in the event of a no-deal Brexit, with some products increasing even more.

He warned consumers could face some disruption to supplies while the industry adjusted to the new situation next year.

Earlier, Mr Allen said the grocer had been stockpiling some non-fresh food as it prepares for potential shortages.

Last ditch trade talks between the UK and EU ended without agreement on Wednesday evening when Prime Minister Boris Johnson met in Brussels with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

Time is running out to reach a deal before 31 December, when the UK stops following EU trading rules.

Mr Allen forecast that without a deal food inflation would climb between 3% and 5%, and "vastly more on some selected items".

Stockpiling

Despite the impact on prices, he said consumers can expect "pretty much the same choice of products" on the shelves once Tesco had adjusted to the new set-up.

Mr Allan said Tesco was able to stockpile what he called "longer-life food", but there could be temporary shortages of "short-life fresh foods".

He told Bloomberg: "We are trying to ensure that we have stockpiled as much as we can of long-life products either in our own warehouses or with our suppliers."

Will food be more expensive after 1 January?

Under WTO rules, supermarkets and other importers would have to pay substantial tariffs on many foods they bring in from the EU.

Meat and dairy products face particularly high tariffs, but many other areas including fruit and vegetables would be also affected.

As an extreme case, the London School of Economics estimates that some speciality cheeses such as halloumi and roquefort could be 55% more expensive.

(Tariffs don't just apply to food - cars made in the EU, for instance, would attract a 10% tariff. But food and drinks are the area where the highest tariffs apply.)

Government minister George Eustice said prices on average would rise less than 2%, although he admitted some items such as pork and beef would be hit harder.

In the short term, shops could absorb those extra costs themselves. But in the longer term they would likely pass some or all of that cost on to customers, in the form of higher prices.

Earlier on Wednesday, the government announced a series of measures to address urgent concerns about the operation of trade between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK.

With a couple of rare exceptions, all goods going from UK to Northern Ireland will be exempt from EU tariffs. Proposed food safety checks on goods entering NI will be waived for a grace period of three months.

Mr Allen said three months was better than nothing and a "a step in the right direction".

Brexit - The basics

Brexit happened but rules didn't change at once: The UK left the European Union on 31 January 2020, but leaders needed time to negotiate a deal for life afterwards - they got 11 months.

Talks are happening: The UK and the EU have until 31 December 2020 to agree a trade deal as well as other things, such as fishing rights.

If there is no deal: Border checks and taxes will be introduced for goods travelling between the UK and the EU. But deal or no deal, we will still see changes.

Tesco has also been diverting shipments to ports other than Dover, which he described as "the throat that gets squeezed".

It comes as ports such as Felixstowe and Southampton face severe delays caused by a surge in imports, leading some to warn that soaring freight costs could be passed on to UK consumers.

On Wednesday, trade group Logistics UK blamed the disruption on concerns about a no-deal Brexit, as well as Covid and the Christmas rush.

Mr Allan cautioned against altering UK food regulations after Brexit, telling the BBC that food suppliers had "no wish to deviate from current food standards".

He spoke out against allowing imports of US chlorine-washed chicken, saying: "I think most of the food industry is opposed to it."

He added: "I can't see us being enthusiastic about contributing to anything that would lower food standards in the UK."

Like other supermarkets, Tesco has seen its profits surge in the pandemic as people spend more time at home and splash out on food.

Last week, the retailer said it would repay £585m in business rates relief after it was criticised for paying dividends to shareholders.

Other retailers followed suit, including Asda, Morrisons and Sainsbury's.

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Tesco: Brexit 'could see people choose cheddar over brie'

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Brits could turn back to cheddar if the price of French cheese shoots up after a no-deal Brexit. Tesco's chair John Allan told the BBC that import taxes could push up the price of brie by as much as 40%. He said it might "change the mix of what people eat", leading to people buying more British cheddar.

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Taiwan seeks entry into key trade pact before China

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Taiwan has warned that its application into the CPTPP could be affected should China join first.

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"import taxes could push up the price of brie by as much as 40%."

"without a deal food inflation would climb between 3% and 5%, and "vastly more on some selected items".

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Boris Johnson has held talks with President Biden at the White House - but the American administration has played down the chances of brokering a separate post-Brexit free trade deal with the UK.

BBC editors and correspondents look at the prospects of securing a stand-alone agreement with the US and ask if joining an existing North American trade pact instead is a more realistic option.

The UK and USMCA - is there a benefit?

Brexit gave the UK the freedom to strike its own trade deals - and accounting for £1 in every £6 of British trade, a pact with the US was the ultimate prize.

But Whitehall officials have for months been scrabbling for an alternative after the Biden administration indicated it was in no hurry to resume talks.

Joining USMCA - the existing trade arrangement between the US, Canada and Mexico - could give the UK deeper benefits on some goods and digital trade with North American economies.

But it has limited coverage of what is the U.K.'s biggest strength when it comes to selling to America, namely services.

Economists say the overall gains from joining USMCA may be very limited, perhaps less than 0.1% of GDP

And what would the price be?

The UK already has deals with Canada and Mexico, it would have to rely heavily on American cooperation to join this trade club - and one where the rules have already been set, and hasn't allowed for new members.

America's price of admission may include a hurdle already encountered: standards surrounding food and agricultural goods

For President Biden is explicit that his priority is US workers, not least its farmers.

He is also clear that domestic issues take precedence.

Even if the UK does want to sign up to USMCA, it may still be at the back of a queue - simply to get its application considered.

What about trade with the world's largest economies?

The government highlights the fact that it has signed trade deals with more than 60 countries since it left the European Union.

But the vast majority of them are rollover deals, copying the terms of agreements it already had when it was part of the EU.

It has been an achievement to have concluded these deals so quickly, but it has not added to the sum of British trade around the world.

The UK's deal with Japan is marginally different than the EU's, so is an updated agreement it signed in June with Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein.

The UK has also agreed a deal in principle with Australia, which the EU has not. But that agreement has yet to come into effect, and will comprise only a tiny part of overall UK trade.

So, that leaves the world's three largest economies.

Trade with China will always be fraught with difficulty for political reasons.

President Biden has now confirmed what has been obvious for some time - that a free trade deal with the United States is not going to happen any time soon.

And Britain chose to leave the EU and its single market, and sign a new deal which limits the access it had before.

As a result, according to the EU's statistics office Eurostat, British exports to the EU in the first seven months of this year fell by more than 17% compared to the same period in 2020.

The coronavirus pandemic may have been an inhibiting factor for trade, but exports from all other major economies to the EU have risen.

Better trading opportunities and a long-term focus on fast-growing markets in Asia were arguments put forward by supporters of Brexit.

But leaving the EU is going to mean the UK does less trade around the world in the next few years, not more.

Friendly relations - but bumps in the road

With Joe Biden and the Democrats back in charge in Washington, the US was expected to strengthen ties with Europe and put the UK, to paraphrase Barack Obama, toward the back of the queue.

Donald Trump's focus on transactional diplomacy and penchant for one-on-one deals was out; multilateralism was again in vogue.

That's not exactly how things have played out, however.

On Tuesday morning, Biden gave a speech at the United Nations emphasising the need for collective action by the community of nations.

But by the evening, he was back at the White House for a one-on-one meeting with Boris Johnson, talking up a US-UK relationship that has taken on greater relevance for the Biden administration in the past few weeks.

Although Johnson earlier spoke of US-UK relations that are "as good as they have been in decades", there are still a few bumps in the road.

The US seems uninterested in prioritising a new trade deal. Biden's "we'll have to work that through" comment on Tuesday wasn't exactly an enthusiastic response.

The president, who regularly boasts of his Irish heritage, has also warned of what he sees as the danger Brexit poses to stability in Northern Ireland - a point he again alluded to on Tuesday.

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BBC specialists look at the prospects for UK-US trade

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Boris Johnson has held talks with President Biden at the White House - but the American administration has played down the chances of brokering a separate post-Brexit free trade deal with the UK. BBC editors and correspondents look at the prospects of securing a stand-alone agreement with the US and ask if joining an existing North American trade pact instead is a more realistic option.

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France tries to delay EU-Australia trade deal amid Aukus fallout

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France seeks EU support to delay deal as punishment after Australia cancelled £48bn submarine contract

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UAE, India look to double trade to at least $100B over five years

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The UAE is trying to burnish its credentials as a hub for business in the face of growing competition from Saudi Arabia.

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"economic pact aimed at boosting business, investment and jobs"

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"UAE says bi-lateral trade could reach up to $100 billion"

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"Indian nationals make up one of the largest population groups in the oil-rich UAE, a major source of foreign remittances."

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"the UAE, a desert country that relies heavily on imports, committed $7 billion in 2019 to set up a “food corridor” and invest in Indian agriculture."

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"committing to invest as much as $10 billion in sectors ranging from energy, infrastructure and ports to tourism and agriculture.

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Sign up to myFT Daily Digest to be the first to know about UK trade news.

The UK hopes to join a trade pact between the US, Mexico and Canada as expectations fade for an imminent bilateral agreement with Washington.

The USMCA trade pact was signed last year by then US president Donald Trump with Canada and Mexico after a long renegotiation of the 1994 Nafta deal between the three countries.

The agreement, which was widely backed by Democrats on Capitol Hill, included tightened environmental and labour standards, a new digital chapter and strict rules of origin requirements for the automotive industry.

British officials said on Tuesday shortly before UK prime minister Boris Johnson was to meet President Joe Biden that Britain was considering applying to join USMCA. "There are a variety of different ways to do this," noted one senior official. "The question is whether the US administration is ready. The ball is in the US's court. It takes two to tango."

Britain already has trade agreements with Canada and Mexico, so the main gains would be linked to the US element of the deal.

However, the Biden administration has made clear that trade deals are not a legislative priority as it focuses on its domestic economic agenda.

Trade experts questioned whether it was realistic for the UK to join the pact and, even if it could, whether the price of entry would be worth paying.

Dmitry Grozoubinski, a trade consultant who is visiting professor at the University of Strathclyde, said any accession process would leave the US, Mexico and Canada with the whip hand, free to name their price for joining what is essentially a regional trade pact.

"It's certainly ambitious," he said, "And it's also not clear how this would resolve the fundamental challenges to a US-UK free trade deal, which is firstly that the US has no appetite for it and, secondly, there remain significant areas, like agrifood standards, on which the two sides fundamentally disagree."

David Henig, director of the UK Trade Policy Project, said it remained "someone else's trade agreement with the rules made by someone else".

Henig estimated that joining USMCA might add perhaps only 0.1 to 0.2 per cent of gross domestic product to the British economy while still leaving the UK open to some of the problems associated with a possible bilateral US trade deal.

"Are the benefits really worth it?" he asked.

USMCA also has limited coverage of many of the UK's competitive advantage in exports, notably services, and would subject many British companies to two competing sets of regulations.

But Sam Lowe, research fellow at the Centre for European Reform, said it would be "quite an occasion" if Britain were to join USMCA, even though he was sceptical that it would happen.

"You would have all the issues with a bilateral US relationship - they don't go away," he said. "But from an economic point of view, a deal would not be negligible."

Pro-Brexit politicians in the UK have long pointed to a trade deal with the US as one of the great upsides of leaving the EU. Leading figures in the Trump administration early last year promised that a US-UK trade deal was at the "top of the list" of priorities.

However, the UK's hopes of clinching a bilateral trade deal with the US have faded since Biden came to power in January.

Recommended

Speaking alongside Johnson ahead of the meeting in the White House on Tuesday, Biden said they would discuss trade. "On a Brexit free trade . . . We're going to talk a little bit about trade today and we're going to have to work that through", he said.

The two sides have not resumed formal talks, and Katherine Tai, the US trade representative, has been carrying out an assessment of the state of the negotiations.

On Britain's proposal to join the USMCA, a spokesman for the USTR said: "We have not received a request to join the USMCA and there is no accession clause in the agreement."

British officials have previously expressed hopes that the US would join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership trade bloc, opening a back door to closer US-UK trade ties since London is also seeking to become a member of the CPTPP.

They are understood to have raised concerns with their US counterparts that trade links are stronger between the UK, Canada and Mexico than between the UK and US.

Speaking to Sky News before the White House meeting with Biden, Johnson evaded a question on whether he might secure a trade deal with the US by 2024. "We will keep going with free trade deals around the world including in the United States. I have plenty of reason to be optimistic about that. But the Americans do negotiate very hard," the prime minister said.

"We're going to go as fast as we can."

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UK pins hope on joining US-Mexico-Canada trade pact

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Sign up to myFT Daily Digest to be the first to know about UK trade news. The UK hopes to join a trade pact between the US, Mexico and Canada as expectations fade for an imminent bilateral agreement with Washington.

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"It (the trade) will strengthen our position as a global gateway to Africa, Asia and Europe."

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"It (the trade) will strengthen our position as a global gateway to Africa, Asia and Europe."

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Ministry ready for more mini-FTAs

Mr Jurin, centre, presides at the MoU signing between Thailand and Kofu city - the first mini trade agreement inked by the International Trade Promotion Department and Kofu City to increase trade, investment and economic cooperation.

Thailand aims to clinch deals to form deeper trade partnerships through "mini-FTAs" with Hainan, China and Telangana, India by August after the country on Monday inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to form a mini free trade agreement (mini-FTA) with Kofu city in central Japan.

Commerce Minister Jurin Laksanawisit, who presided over the MoU signing on Monday, said the government is also pursuing similar mini-FTAs with other places including Gyeonggi province in South Korea.

"We are accelerating this partnership process with other states, as mini-FTA plans are a key policy the ministry is pursuing to boost trade, investment and economic cooperation," he said.

According to Mr Jurin, the deeper trade partnerships at the city or state level will help boost trade and investment in targeted industries.

Kofu is a regional commercial and transport hub for the central Yamanashi prefecture.

Local industries include gems and jewellery, food processing including wine production, textiles and crystalware.

Yamanashi was originally famous for quartz crystal jewellery production and over the centuries became the leading region in Japan for gemstone and precious metal processing.

Around 30% of Japan's carved jewellery is produced in the prefecture, making Yamanashi not only Japan's No.1 jewellery region but also one of the most famed hubs in the world.

"The MoU signing with Kofu city is expected to bring about several mutual benefits to Thailand and Japan, whether it involves manufacturing, joint marketing or technology transfers," said Mr Jurin.

"This deeper cooperation is estimated to increase the trade value in gems and jewellery between Thailand and Japan by 5% to not less than 15.5 billion baht this year."

The trade partnership with Kofu is the first mini trade agreement for the Thai government.

A similar pact with Telangana state in India was scheduled to take place in January this year but was postponed.

Two-way trade between Thailand and Japan tallied US$50.5 billion last year, with exports from Thailand accounting for $22.8 billion and imports worth $27.7 billion.

Thailand posted a trade deficit of $4.87 billion with Japan last year.

In the first five months this year, two-way trade reached $24.9 billion, up 16% from the same period of last year.

Exports from Thailand made up $10.4 billion, up 9.21%, while imports were worth $14.5 billion, up 21.5%.

Thailand had a trade deficit of $4.12 billion with Japan in the first five months this year.

The government has set a target to raise exports to Japan by 4% to $23.35 billion this year.

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Thailand aims to clinch deals to form deeper trade partnerships through "mini-FTAs" with Hainan, China and Telangana, India by August after the country on Monday inked a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to form a mini free trade agreement (mini-FTA) with Kofu city in central Japan.

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french submarine dispute could torpedo eu-australia trade talks - cnn

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French submarine dispute could torpedo EU-Australia trade talks

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France is threatening to block talks on a planned free trade agreement between Europe and Australia after the Australian government ditched a huge deal to buy French submarines.