Implemented jointly by ICTSD and the World Economic Forum, the E15Initiative convenes world-class experts and institutions to generate strategic analysis and recommendations for government, business and civil society geared towards strengthening the global trade and investment system for sustainable development. The E15 Expert Group on Competition Policy is co-convened with Bruegel . This think-piece reports the findings of a mapping exercise of the competition-related provisions of 216 free trade agreements (FTAs) included in the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Regional Trade Agreements (RTA) database. This represents by far the largest sample of FTAs analyzed to date in this type of mapping exercise. Where available, it also reviews official proposals for and accounts of the negotiations of a competition policy chapter in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). But it does not review provisions that are not competition-specific but arguably also impact competition policy and enforcement (for example, non-discrimination and transparency). With a view to identifying both common ground and significant discrepancies between different approaches to addressing competition-related issues in FTAs, it pays close attention to differences in language, terminology, and scope. To begin with, it establishes a typology of competition-related provisions in FTAs, and provides...
Written by François-Charles Laprévote, Sven Frisch, Burcu Can