COVID-19’s impact on connectivity and trade - Sustainable responses in the digital era

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a severe impact on the global economic outlook, including by exposing the resiliency of supply chains in an unprecedented way. International movement of people and goods has been facing terrific challenges posed by severe global travel and trade restrictions. Indeed, most countries have closed their borders to some extent, putting the current global economic setting, including global supply chains, under tremendous pressure. The current situation has shown that the use of innovative digital tools can be instrumental in facilitating the flow of goods across borders and address the many challenges brought to global trade and connectivity by COVID-19 in a sustainable manner.

Key experts elaborated how the OSCE could support its participating States in coping with and recovering from the crisis.

• Ambasador Vuk Žugić, Co-ordinator of OSCE Economic and Environmental Activities 
• Ambassador Hinrich Thoelken, Special Envoy for digitalization and digital transformation, German Federal Foreign Office
• Ms. Olga Pindyuk, Economist, Vienna Institute for International Economic Studies
• Mr. Allan Lerberg Jørgensen, Head of Sustainable Trade, Maersk
• Mr. Rajesh Aggarwal, Chief Trade Facilitation and Policy for Business Section, International Trade Centre

RECOMMENDATIONS

During the discussion among more than 100 participants a number of recommendations were made:

• Need to internationally co-operate in these challenging times. The OSCE could support its partipating States in mitigating the challenges posed by the pandemic on global trade and market security and in enhancing connectivity by promoting trade facilitation and removing trade barriers in the OSCE area.
• OSCE can serve as a catalyst for bringing experts together with a view to eleborate solutions to increase the resilience of global trade in light of potential future crisis similar to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• In the field of transport facilitation, the OSCE could contribute to the further improvement of electronic document management systems in the field of international transport of goods and simplification and harmonization of customs procedures.
• OSCE can play a very important role to address country-specific challenges in the field of trade and connectivity, particularly for landlocked countries.