MEDIA EDUCATION
NPF International Trade Fellowship 2024
The National Press Foundation annually hosts the International Trade Fellowship workshop for journalists, sponsored by the Hinrich Foundation.
This year, the Foundations welcomed 25 Asia-based journalists at the Hinrich Foundation's office in Singapore. The sessions covered themes such as the impact of US presidential elections on trade, digitization of trade, Asia’s evolving role in global trade, and more.
The training kicked off with a welcome address by Anne Godlasky, President of the Washington, D.C.-based National Press Foundation, and Chuin Wei Yap, the Hinrich Foundation’s research director. Deborah Elms, Head of Trade Policy, delivered the keynote on the rising challenges of global trade distortion, the use of tariffs as a trade policy tool, and fragmenting supply chains.
In the panels that followed, Steven Okun, founder and CEO of APAC Advisors, unpacked the complexities of the US presidential elections and its geoeconomic impact on global trade, providing insights into how the trade policies of Trump and Biden differ.
Manu Bhaskaran, founding CEO of Centennial Asia Advisors, examined India’s economic growth drivers and the challenges it faces in sustaining its growth boom. He highlighted recent changes in the country’s trade and investment outlook and emphasized on the importance of capitalizing the economic opportunities presented by the global “China plus one” strategy.
Heng Dean Law of the climate investment firm Pollination discussed the role of renewable energy in Southeast Asia’s energy transition, underscoring the challenges of decarbonization and transfer of green energy in the region. He noted that Southeast Asia’s geographical terrain poses significant challenges in adopting green infrastructure, especially cross-border power grids.
Kavita Chandran from the Thomson Reuters Foundation addressed the modern slavery issues in global supply chains, covering labor exploitation, human trafficking, and child labor. Daniel Giles from the global standard-setter GS1 briefed Fellows on the advancements in digital trade and its expanding role as an industry sector in international policy.
Chen Gang of the East Asian Institute at the National University of Singapore and Yuan Mei from Singapore Management University provided an overview of the "China shock", including China’s export-driven economic growth, dynamic trade strategies, and its manufacturing success in critical sectors such as electric vehicles, solar panels, and batteries.
The four-day workshop wrapped on 26 June with a session on Asia’s evolving role in geopolitics and global trade by Bilahari Kausikan, former Ambassador-at-Large for Singapore. He addressed a wide range of issues, including ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, China and US positions in a rising global geopolitical contest, and Singapore and Asia's outlook in these evolving challenges.
The training program also featured a field visit to the Port of Singapore, the world’s busiest trans-shipment port, and the port’s innovation center, a multimedia showcase of the island-nation’s next-generation supply chain ecosystem.
