Trade-offs and Tensions

In the episode, Tobi talks to Dmitry Grozoubinski about the politics and complexities of global trade, emphasizing the tension between free trade and protectionism. Dmitry explains how trade policy decisions involve difficult choices that impact both producers and consumers, using Nigeria's food inflation as an example. They explore the balance between national interests and global commitments, highlighting how protectionist policies are often rooted in political concerns rather than economic efficiency. The conversation also touches on the challenges of multilateral trade agreements like the WTO and AfCFTA.

Dmitry served as an Australian diplomat and trade negotiator at the World Trade Organisation and beyond. He has negotiated complex agreements in Geneva, at WTO and UN Ministerial Conferences in Kenya, and as part of the MH17 task force in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Before joining the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, he was a lecturer and tutor at the Monash Graduate School of Business and with the Australian trade consultancy TradeWorthy. He is the lead trainer of ExplainTrade and a Visiting Professor at the University of Strathclyde’s School of Law.

Transcript

Tobi: The complexity of trade agreements, the bargaining, the negotiation, and everything that surrounds the politics of trade generally does not get covered so much. It's always about the economics of it. And that's what I love about what you do, your project, your book, and everything. So my first question to you is that I know you wrote this basically from the perspective of global trade, and with everything that has been happening, I would say, basically, since the Trump presidency, which, like, brought trade into the headlines, particularly with the US-China “trade war”, quote unquote. And, of course, COVID is what we see with supply chains, decoupling, and so forth. But, I would also say to you that in development, the sub-field of economics that we call development, which is what we try to cover here on the show, trade is also a huge deal.

I'll give you a bit of a background. In Nigeria, currently, one of the biggest policy issues is the government trying to decide whether or not to allow the importation of food, basically rice, wheat, and all this other basic stuff. Primarily because food inflation is way above 40%. There's basically a cost of living crisis that has been going on for a few years. People are hungry, people are starving, people are angry because their incomes can no longer even feed them, you know? And so it generates this intense debate because on the other side of that, you have the producer class - the farmers and various lobby groups and political interests who say that, “oh, you really can't import, you're going to turn the country to a dumping ground, we're going to de-industrialise and so many other things.”

So one practical question I'll start with you is, if I were a politician, for example, and you know, with the title of your book, let's say that I am an honest politician. Let's assume that I'm an honest politician and I'm asking you that, Dmitry, how do I make this decision? What practical advice would you give me when considering trade policies generally? How do I make trade policy?

Dmitry:

I think that's a really good question, and I think it kind of goes to the heart of what trade policy is. Anytime you're doing trade policy, you're making choices, and they're often hard choices. You just laid it out perfectly there. You have farmers and other producers of food in Nigeria that are benefiting from very high prices. And you have consumers that are effectively suffering because a substantial part of their weekly budget is going to food, and more than was going before. You mentioned inflation at 40%. That is hugely unsustainable. So as a politician, when you are talking about the choice of bringing in more food, the f