Anchoring Reform with a US-Egypt Free Trade Agreement

by Ahmed Galal, Robert Lawrence

Overview

The relationship between the United States and the Muslim/Arab world has deteriorated since September 11, 2001. The United States is widely perceived as targeting Arab nations for their oil, especially in the wake of the war in Iraq. Measures are needed on both sides to build a more peaceful, prosperous Middle East. A free trade agreement with Egypt could be an instrument toward achieving this goal. If the United States were to select its FTA partners based on relative political importance in their regions, Egypt would top the list among Arab states. This study considers the key economic and political characteristics of Egypt as a potential FTA partner. It examines the benefits and challenges in pursuing bilateral negotiations with Egypt, examines the Bush proposal for a regional arrangement, and assesses the impact of a prospective FTA on other trading partners, on the Middle East/Arab world, and on the multilateral trading system. If an FTA with Egypt materializes, the gains can be substantial to all parties involved.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780881323689
Publisher:	Peterson Institute for International Economics
Publication date:	05/30/2005
Series:	Policy Analyses in International Economics , #74
Pages:	104
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Ahmed Galal is executive director and director of research at the Egyptian Center for Economic Studies (ECES) in Cairo. He has also been a staff member of the World Bank since 1984, where he served as industrial economist in Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa; senior then principal economist in the bank's research arm; and economic adviser to the private-sector development department. His works include, among others, Building Bridges: An Egypt-U.S. Free Trade Agreement (Brookings Institution Press, 1998) and Monetary Policy and Exchange Rate Regimes: Options for the Middle East (ECES, 2002).

Robert Z. Lawrence was a senior fellow and also the Albert L. Williams Professor of Trade and Investment at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He served a s amember of PResident Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers form 1999 to 2000. He hes the New Century Chair as a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution between 1997 and 1998.