Publications /
Policy Brief

Back
Changes in the Commodities Market - Part 2: What is the role for international trading companies?
Authors
February 4, 2015

The gradual withdrawal of western banks from the commodity sector is a significant opportunity for the historically large traders, whose economic role should be strengthened. These traders however are facing new constraints: reduced margins, competition from other industry players operating in vertical integration strategies and the rise of Asian traders. International trade is now at a historic turning point.

RELATED CONTENT

  • Authors
    Sabine Cessou
    April 16, 2019
    Le rapport Arcadia a été présenté le 9 avril à Paris par le Policy Center for the New South (PCNS) et le Cercle CyclOpe. Ce document de référence fait chaque année le point sur la conjoncture des matières premières africaines. “Elles restent essentielles, avec une forte dépendance pour nombre de pays et une gestion de la rente relativement problématique”, a affirmé en introduction Philippe Chalmin, président du Cercle CyclOpe. Fortement exposées aux chocs extérieurs, les économies ...
  • Authors
    April 16, 2019
    So much hope: Expectations, anticipation, and promises. So many emotions: Excitement, sentiment, and joy. Mild winds caressing leaves of palm trees, moving in the stimulating rhythm of rumba, possibly salsa. The dancing bodies in harmony with the Caribbean mood. Happiness despite misery. Laughter overwhelming fear. Barack Obama visiting Cuba. Rain and tears unite, pomp unmatched by the Pope visiting the island some years earlier, enthusiasm pure. An Afro-American President is willin ...
  • Authors
    Sabine Cessou
    April 16, 2019
    Experts du Nord et du Sud ont discuté de ce thème le 10 avril à Paris, lors de la 7ème édition de ses Dialogues stratégiques entre le Policy Center for the New South et le Centre HEC de géopolitique. La politique étrangère de Donald Trump, centrée sur la devise « America First », répond surtout à des motivations de politique intérieure, a rappelé Pascal Chaigneau, directeur du Centre HEC de Géopolitique. Elle vise à sa réélection pour un second mandat, en posant les questions de re ...
  • Authors
    Aleksandra Chmielewska
    April 15, 2019
    The author is an alumna of the 2018 Atlantic Dialogues Emerging Leaders program The success of a Spanish far right party, Vox, wining 12 seats as a result of the regional elections in Andalucía, made the headlines in December 2018. The triumph of Vox was even more remarkable, as the party has gained 395.879 votes, in comparison to 18.017 received in 2015 elections. Marie Le Pen and Geert Wilders, leaders of other European far right parties rushed to congratulate Santiago Abascal, o ...
  • Authors
    Lorenzo Colantoni
    Giuseppe Montesano
    Nicolò Sartori
    April 12, 2019
    Access to electricity is a key factor for the future of the African continent. Energy poverty and lack of universal access to electricity services are, in fact, remarkably hurting human progress in Africa. Today, sub-Saharan Africa hosts 14 percent of the world’s population but 60 percent of the world’s people without access to electricity: of the more than 1 billion people globally who had no access to electricity, around 600 million lived in the region. In these conditions, many A ...
  • Authors
    April 10, 2019
    Africa is experiencing a demographic boom, so as its population is expected to double by 2050 to reach 2.8 billion. The growth in Africa’s working-age population will be inevitable. The youth population will also grow to make of Africa the continent of youth ‘par excellence’, so as it will hold the largest number of young people in the globe. Source: UN DESA | United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, 2018 Against this outlook, economic growth is essential for Afric ...
  • Authors
    Carlos Antonio Carrasco
    Pascal Chaigneau
    Nicolas Desgrais
    Thierry Garcin
    Firmin Edouard Matoko
    Bouchra Rahmouni
    Michel Raimbaud
    Olivier Tramond
    April 10, 2019
    À travers cette publication conjointe, le Centre HEC de Géopolitique et le Policy Center for the New South ont souhaité présenter seize papiers discutés et enrichis au cours de la sixième édition des Dialogues Stratégiques qui s’est tenue le 3 octobre 2018. Cette rencontre avait choisi d’analyser l’espace politique et les enjeux géostratégiques de notre monde contemporain en se focalisant sur deux sujets d’actualité internationale : les crises et sorties de crises en Amérique latine ...
  • Authors
    Under the direction of
    Philippe Chalmin
    April 9, 2019
    Commodity prices were once again marked by significant volatility in 2017 and 2018. While there are many economic factors to explain this, politics were also present—trade tensions between China and the United States and, more generally, a rise in uncertainties—weighing upon the global macroeconomic outlook and the ‘dynamism of the markets’. Africa, which has countries with strong growth rates, has, however, been able to show solid economic performance, and this trajectory is not li ...