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ProDoc Trade
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ProDoc Trade Programme
The ProDoc Trade is a research and training programme that brings together PhD students and professors from the University of Geneva, the University of Lausanne and the Graduate Institute of International and Development studies, as well as economists working in the Geneva-based International Organisations devoted to trade (mainly the WTO, ITC and UNCTAD). This networking aims at an agglomeration of excellence in research and making the Lémanique area the heart of international trade economics attractive to trade scholars world wide and to first-rate students from around the globe.
The ProDoc Trade provides full scholarships for selected students and consists of a training module and three research modules described below.
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Research Modules
 Graduate Institute
The ProDoc’s research module at the Graduate Institute is led by Richard Baldwin and focuses on challenges to the WTO-centric trade system from unilateralism and regionalism. Its goal is to identify the economic and political economic underpinnings of the erosion of the WTO’s centricity in the trade liberalisation process in particular with respect to regional and unilateral initiatives. The question of multilateralism vs. regionalism turns around the so-called stumbling bloc versus building bloc issue – i.e. do regional trade agreements help or hinder multilateral liberalisation. On the political economy determinants of unilateral liberalisation, the research focuses on the race-to-the-bottom unilateralism as driven by competition among developing nations for manufacturing plants that are part of intricate international supply chains which rely on the unhindered import and export of parts and components.
University of Geneva
The research module at the University of Geneva is led by Marcelo Olarreaga and aims at estimating non-traditional gains from trade agreements, beyond Haberger’s Triangles. Most of the empirical literature on trade agreements focuses on trade creation and trade diversion while a more recent literature argues that there are gains from trade agreements that go beyond increases in trade flows. Trade agreements can help solve time inconsistency and credibility issues faced by governments, reduce uncertainty, help small governments in the signalling game, etc. The objective of this project is to put a dollar number to these gains, with a particular emphasis on developing countries.
University of Lausanne
The research module at the University of Lausanne is led by Olivier Cadot and aims at understating the evolution of the pattern of trade in parts and components to determine the underlying forces. As multinationals have over the last quarter century set up “regional production networks” and “sliced up the value chain”, the production of any given manufactured good has increasingly involved supply chains that cross national boundaries several times. This should presumably raise the import content of manufactured production and hence the number of geographical sources from which any given country imports at the aggregate level. But what of diversification at the product level? Should imports of each good be procured from more or fewer supplier countries?nts.
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TrainingModule
The backbone of the training module consists of individual study programmes that are tailored to the needs of each PhD in the research modules. These are principally composed of graduate-level economics courses taught by the regular faculty at the Graduate Institute, UNIGE and UNIL.
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Organisational Structure
Scientific advisory committee:
Consists of three foreign trade scholars: Prof. Karen Helene Ulltveit-Moe, University of Oslo; Professor Karolina Ekkholm, University of Stockholm; and Professor Tony Venables, University of Oxford. This committee provides overall scientific guidance and evaluation of the programme. It meets at least once a year to discuss matters ranging from the list of research topics, selection of students, thesis’ quality, course subjects, and selection of foreign professors for short courses.
Executive committee:
This committee is formed by the coordinators of the three participating institutions, namely Richard Baldwin (Prof. of International Economics at the Graduate Institute), Marcelo Olarreaga (University of Geneva) and Olivier Cadot (University of Lausanne). It oversees that the Programme runs smoothly in all its aspects. In particular, it is in charge of selecting PhD students, approving the thesis topics in conjunction with the student’s supervisors, and selecting professors and topics for the short courses, reviewing research progress and evaluating the final research output of PhD students.
Programme coordinator:
Dr. Daria Taglioni, who works for ProDoc on a part-time basis is the programme coordinator. She is physically present in Geneva every second week and is located in the Centre on Trade and Economics Integration (CTEI) of the Graduate Institute. Her tasks include helping the student in various ways, including, providing advice on their research, promoting their work and helping them apply for grants and conference participations. When she is not in Geneva, she works as senior economist at the European Central Bank.
Executive director of the doctoral programme:
The Executive Director of the CTEI, Dr. Theresa Carpenter, ensures the coordination of the programme with other programs and initiatives. In so doing, it seeks to maximise economies of scale between ProDoc and parallel programs and initiatives.
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