The Asian 'Noodle Bowl': Is it Serious for Business

A lively debate is taking place over the impact of free trade agreements (FTAs) on East Asia's business between those who view the agreements as a harmful Asian noodle bowl - i.e., overlapping regional trade agreements - of trade deals and others who see net beneficial effects in terms of regional liberalization and a building block to multilateral liberalization. A lack of enterprise-level data has made it difficult to resolve the debate. Providing new evidence from surveys of 609 East Asian firms (in Japan, Singapore, Republic of Korea [hereafter Korea], Thailand, and Philippines), this paper seeks to address the critical question of whether the Asian noodle bowl of multiple overlapping FTAs is harmful to business activity, particularly for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The surveys suggest that the Asian noodle bowl does not seem to have severely harmed the region's business activity to date. Use of FTA preferences is higher than expected from previous studies (22% of responding firms). Furthermore, only 27% of responding firms said that multiple rules of origin significantly added to business cost. However, as more currently under negotiation FTAs take effect and the complexity of the Asian noodle bowl increases, the business impact is likely to intensify. Implementation of key policies and closer publicprivate sector cooperation can help mitigate negative effects and facilitate a more SMEinclusive business response to FTAs. Suggestions include: encouraging most favored nation (MFN) liberalization, rationalization of rules of origin, upgrading origin administration, increased awareness of FTA provisions, improving business participation in FTA consultations, and SME support

日本からタイへの直接投資の動向とその効果 : 日本タイ国際産業連関表による分析

1.はじめに　2. 日本のタイにおける直接投資の動向　3. 日本からタイへの直接投資の効果　1)民間投資需要による生産の誘発効果　2 )民間投資需要による付加価値の誘発効果　3 )付加価値誘発額にみる実際の効果の大きさ　4 )付加価値誘発係数と付加価値貢献度　4. 結びにかえて　付論

Establishing What Constitutes a Healthy Human Gut Microbiome: State of the Science, Regulatory Considerations, and Future Directions.

On December 17, 2018, the North American branch of the International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI North America) convened a workshop "Can We Begin to Define a Healthy Gut Microbiome Through Quantifiable Characteristics?" with >40 invited academic, government, and industry experts in Washington, DC. The workshop objectives were to 1) develop a collective expert assessment of the state of the evidence on the human gut microbiome and associated human health benefits, 2) see if there was sufficient evidence to establish measurable gut microbiome characteristics that could serve as indicators of "health," 3) identify short- and long-term research needs to fully characterize healthy gut microbiome-host relationships, and 4) publish the findings. Conclusions were as follows: 1) mechanistic links of specific changes in gut microbiome structure with function or markers of human health are not yet established; 2) it is not established if dysbiosis is a cause, consequence, or both of changes in human gut epithelial function and disease; 3) microbiome communities are highly individualized, show a high degree of interindividual variation to perturbation, and tend to be stable over years; 4) the complexity of microbiome-host interactions requires a comprehensive, multidisciplinary research agenda to elucidate relationships between gut microbiome and host health; 5) biomarkers and/or surrogate indicators of host function and pathogenic processes based on the microbiome need to be determined and validated, along with normal ranges, using approaches similar to those used to establish biomarkers and/or surrogate indicators based on host metabolic phenotypes; 6) future studies measuring responses to an exposure or intervention need to combine validated microbiome-related biomarkers and/or surrogate indicators with multiomics characterization of the microbiome; and 7) because static genetic sampling misses important short- and long-term microbiome-related dynamic changes to host health, future studies must be powered to account for inter- and intraindividual variation and should use repeated measures within individuals

Asia-Latin America Free Trade Agreements: An Instrument for Inter-Regional Liberalization and Integration?

Trade integration and free trade agreement (FTA)-led cooperation between Asia and Latin America has increased since the early 2000s. Using new criteria, this paper examines whether Asia-Latin America FTAs have facilitated market-led integration by liberalizing trade and behind the border regulatory barriers. Overall Asia-Latin America FTAs provide the foundations for inter-regional integration by liberalizing goods and services trade as well as some regulatory barriers. Future FTAs can support deeper integration by reducing residual regulatory barriers. Other policy priorities include forming a large inter-regional FTA, stimulating business use of FTAs and accelerating structural reforms