Gathering in Mar del Plata in September 2018, G20 trade and investment ministers agreed to “step up dialogue and actions to mitigate risks and enhance confidence in international trade.” The global trade and investment system is in need of such a boost. Trust in the multilateral trading system, for example, is diminishing as economic heavyweights increasingly apply trade measures and practices that undermine the principles and rules that underpin the World Trade Organization (WTO). In this context, and ahead of the 2018 Buenos Aires G20 Leaders Summit and the Japanese presidency in 2019, ICTSD has assembled a collection of short papers that explore how the G20 can help reshape the world trading system. The expert contributions provide inputs around sustainability and systemic concerns in trade-related policymaking and seek to enable leaders from G20 economies, as well as decision-makers and policy researchers around the globe, to identify and address key challenges that prevent the trade and investment system from being inclusive and sustainable.

Contributors: James Bacchus, Victoria Callaway, Dan Ciuriak, Eugenio Díaz-Bonilla, Jonathan Hepburn, Susara J. Jansen van Rensburg, Soledad Leal Campos, Michitaka Nakatomi, Amrita Narlikar, Constanza Negri Biasutti, Fabrizio Sardelli Panzini, Ali Parry, Hector Rogelio Torres, Wilma Viviers, Wang Huiyao, Wang Wen.