The rapid spread of digital technologies is transforming many economic and social activities. While creating many new opportunities, widening digital divides threaten to leave developing countries, and especially least developed countries, further behind.

Rules of origin – the criteria needed to determine the nationality of a product – could make or break the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) that entered into force in May, says a new UNCTAD report.

The World Investment Report supports policymakers by monitoring global and regional foreign direct investment trends and documenting national and international investment policy developments.

It is estimated that 1.1 billion people in the world today have no access to electricity. This is 14 per cent of the world’s population. Some 85 per cent of those without access to electricity live in rural areas, mainly in Africa. Furthermore, 2.8 billion people do not have access to clean forms of energy for cooking.

During the last decade international trade has been characterized by a progressive shift in the use of trade policy instruments.

Nowhere else in the world is radical economic transformation more urgent than in the least developed countries, which have the challenge of accumulating productive capacities at an unprecedented speed, in the face of the rapid reorientation of global production and digital transformation, to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.

Seaborne trade expanded by four percent in 2017, the fastest growth in five years, according to its Review of Maritime Transport 2018. Volumes across all segments are set to grow in 2018, with containerized and dry bulk commodities expected to record the fastest growth at the expense of tanker volumes.

The world economy remains on shaky ground a decade after the 2008 financial crisis, with trade wars a symptom of a deeper malaise, according to UNCTAD’s Trade and Development Report 2018: Power, Platforms and the Free Trade Delusion.

The goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development will guide development policy action over the coming years, in the pursuit of a revitalised Global Partnership for Sustainable Development.

Global flows of foreign direct investment fell by 23 per cent in 2017. Cross-border investment in developed and transition economies dropped sharply, while growth was near zero in developing economies.