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Unlocking Bangladesh-India Trade : Emerging Potential and the Way ForwardThe primary objective of this study is
 to analyze the impact on Bangladesh of increased market
 access in India, both within a static production structure
 and also identifying dynamic gains. The study shows that
 Bangladesh and India would both gain by opening up their
 markets to each other. Indian investments in Bangladesh will
 be very important for the latter to ramp up its exports,
 including products that would broaden trade complementarity
 and enhance intra-industry trade, and improve its trade
 standards and trade-handling capacity. A bilateral Free
 Trade Agreement would lift Bangladesh's exports to
 India by 182 percent, and nearly 300 percent if transaction
 costs were also reduced through improved connectivity. These
 numbers, based on existing trade patterns, represent a lower
 bound of the potential increase in Bangladesh's exports
 arising from a Free Trade Agreement. A Free Trade Agreement
 would also raise India's exports to Bangladesh.
 India's provision of duty-free access for all
 Bangladeshi products (already done) could increase the
 latter's exports to India by 134 percent. In helping
 Bangladesh's economy to grow, India would stimulate
 economic activity in its own eastern and north-eastern
 states. Challenges exist, however, including non-tariff
 measures/barriers in both countries, excessive bureaucracy,
 weak trade facilitation, and customs inefficiencies. Trade
 in education and health care services offers valuable
 prospects, but also suffers from market access issues. To
 enable larger gains, Bangladesh-India cooperation should go
 beyond goods trade and include investment, finance, services
 trade, trade facilitation, and technology transfer, and be
 placed within the context of regional cooperation.
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What Does MFN Trade Mean for India and Pakistan? Can MFN be a Panacea?India and Pakistan, the two largest
 economies in South Asia, share a common border, culture and
 history. Despite the benefits of proximity, the two
 neighbors have barely traded with each other. In 2011, trade
 with Pakistan accounted for less than half a percent of
 India's total trade, whereas Pakistan's trade with
 India was 5.4 percent of its total trade. However, the
 recent thaw in India-Pakistan trade relations could signal a
 change. Pakistan has agreed to grant most favored nation
 status to India. India has already granted most favored
 nation status to Pakistan. What will be the gains from trade
 for the two countries? Will they be inclusive? Is most
 favored nation status a panacea? Should the granting of most
 favored nation status be accompanied by improvements in
 trade facilitation, infrastructure, connectivity, and
 logistics to reap the true benefits of trade and to promote
 shared prosperity? This paper attempts to answer these
 questions. It examines alternative scenarios on the gains
 from trade and it finds that what makes most favored nation
 status work is the trade facilitation that surrounds it. The
 results of the general equilibrium simulation indicate
 Pakistan's most favored nation status to India would
 generate larger benefits if it were supported by improved
 connectivity and trade facilitation measures. In other
 words, gains from trade would be small in the absence of
 improved connectivity and trade facilitation. The idea of
 trade facilitation is simple: implement measures to reduce
 the cost of trading across borders by improving
 infrastructure, institutions, services, policies,
 procedures, and market-oriented regulatory systems. The
 returns can be huge, even with modest resources and limited
 capacity. The dividends of trade facilitation can be shared
 by all.
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Africa's Silk Road : China and India's New Economic FrontierAs illustrated in Africa's Silk
 Road: China and India's New Economic Frontier, the new
 South-South economic relations present real opportunities-as
 well as challenges-to African countries. They also highlight
 the need for complementary reforms by China and India to
 support more vigorous African development. In analyzing
 Africa's intensifying relationships with China and
 India, Africa's Silk Road examines the trends to date
 and considers the implications of these developments for the
 economic future of the African continent. The diagnosis
 cautions that the opportunities engendered by China and
 India's trade and investment with Africa will not
 necessarily be converted into growth and poverty reduction
 in the region. A critical finding of the study is that it is
 not just the quantity of these trade and investment flows
 that matters-it is also the quality of the overall
 commercial relationships underlying as well as shaping these
 flows. This paper contains the following headings:
 connecting two continents; performance and patterns of
 African-Asian trade and investment flows; challenges at the
 border - Africa and Asia's trade and investment
 policies; behind-the-border constraints on African-Asian
 trade and investment flows; between-the-border factors in
 African-Asian trade and investment; and investment-trade
 linkages in African-Asian commerce - scale, integration, and
 production networks.