The International Institute for Sustainable Development’s Global Subsidies Initiative (GSI) is a project designed to put the spotlight on subsidies and the corrosive effects they can have on environmental quality, economic development and governance.
A GSI report finds that the Australian government spent A$ 95 million on supporting biofuel production and consumption in 2006–07. That cost could grow to several hundred million dollars a year by the end of the decade if planned new ethanol and biodiesel capacity comes on-line over the next two years. Currently, biofuels contribute less than 0.5 per cent of Australia’s transport-fuel needs. For more information, click here.
GSI Reports
May 2008The FiFo Institute for Public Economics of the University of Cologne has applied a template developed by the Global Subsidies Initiative for notifying subsidies to the World Trade Organization, using Germany as the test case. The study reveals that the template vastly improves subsidy reporting. For more information, click here.
November 2007
Investment Incentives: Growing use, uncertain benefits, uneven controls
The Global Subsidies Initiative has released a new report on investment incentives around the world. For more information, click here.
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Biofuels At What Cost? The GSI series of reports on government support to biofuels
Government Support for Ethanol and Biodiesel in Selected OECD Countries
This report provides an overview and analysis of subsidies to biofuels in Australia, Canada, the European Union, Switzerland and the United States. Read more ...
Government Support for Ethanol and Biodiesel in the United States: 2007 Update
This report, which updates the GSI’s report issued last October, details the extent of the current government support to biofuels in the United States, and analyzes the impact of forthcoming legislation, namely the Energy and Farm Bills. Released on 23 October in Washington D.C. Read more ...
For the original October 2006 report on government support to biofuels in the United States, click here.
Government Support for Ethanol and Biodiesel in the European Union
Total annual support for biofuels provided by EU governments reached € 3.7 billion in 2006. Considering that many subsidies are difficult to track down, this is probably an under-estimate. Read more ...
A New Template for Notifying Subsidies to the WTO
By Ronald Steenblik and Juan Simón
Draft for external review - February 2007
Transparency is a foundation stone of the World Trade Organization's Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures (ASCM) -- the first multilateral agreement to establish disciplines on its members’ use of subsidies. Under Article 25 of the ASCM, countries are obliged to submit notifications describing those subsidies that have an impact on global trade.
However, the WTO Secretariat has signalled that compliance with the ASCM's obligations to provide new and full notifications is too low, both in terms of the number of Members submitting notifications and the timeliness of those notifications.
Download: A new template for notifying subsidies to the WTO (PDF)
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Subsidy Watch: the Global Subsidies Initiative's monthly newsletter
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