Trade topics rarely make for dinner table conversation or work-break chats by the water cooler.

Invest in developing your message — what drives you and makes you stand out.

Working with educators, parliamentarians, journalists or others who influence the public can help build understanding of the potential of trade.

A recent survey in the United States and Europe indicates the challenge facing communicators in turning support for trade into further lowering of trade barriers.

If we advocate for trade as a force for development, can we afford to ignore non-governmental organizations (NGOs)?

The NGO protests at WTO meetings that everyone has seen on television are the tip of something bigger. NGOs are more involved in trade than they used to be. While their most visible image in trade is that of televised confrontation, in practice their role is more nuanced.

Grass-roots NGOs build business skills, provide microcredit and target export markets. They’ve done this for years, but now that the impact of trade reaches everywhere, NGOs are becoming more conscious of their links to export markets. From environment and health to tourism and more, ITC has found itself partnering with NGOs in several of its field projects.

Oxfam is a major non-governmental organization in trade policy debates. It also has a role in local trade development. What kind of collaboration is possible with an advocacy NGO? Natalie Domeisen and Peter Hulm of Trade Forum spoke to Céline Charveriat, head of Oxfam’s trade office in Geneva.

What does “fair trade” mean? You won’t find one single answer. Here we look at the market profile of fair trade — the players, controversies, benefits and drawbacks.

Fair trade in international commerce has two distinct meanings. In trade negotiations, the term is used broadly to argue that subsidies and disguised barriers skew the global trade system against developing countries and commodity producers. Former World Bank chief economist and Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz, for example, argues for “fair trade for all” in the context of the latest WTO round of trade liberalization, the Doha Development Agenda.

A new trade democracy? Perhaps not yet, but signs of change are there.

A short time ago, people saw trade policy as a matter for economists outlining trade scenarios, government officials negotiating behind closed doors or business lobbies in Washington, Brussels, Geneva and other cities.

The challenge to building business advocacy is to develop business–government dialogue, but also to bring in small firms, the informal sector and other parts of society.

We need to address the “double face” of globalization and work towards sustainable economic and social development for all people.

Peru’s young business hopefuls are getting a taste of the international market while still at university through the case studies and ideas in ITC’s magazine.

If you promote the potential of trade for development, look twice at the power of strategic communications.

Communications plays a key role in every organization that wants results. A strategic approach can help them use resources effectively to achieve their goals.

We discovered, almost by accident last year, how countries are “putting their stamp” on trade. Research on stamps came up as part of the creative design process in profi ling case studies on successful trade development projects. While we did not include stamps in the final result, we were struck by the results of a search for stamps on the Universal Postal Union’s online database. (Stamps are catalogued from the year 2000; we inserted a variety of key words dealing with trade.)

Australia is embarking on an ambitious plan to double the number of Australian exporters by 2006 and to increase community support for international trade by raising awareness of the benefits of trade and investment.

How can trade experts and journalists work together to make sense of global change?

The media has a duty to inform the public about trade matters that affect their lives. But with limited resources and too little interaction with trade bodies, Southern journalists have a hard time.

Simply building a web site won’t bring visitors. It takes careful strategy and targeted marketing to lure visitors to the site once, and even more work to bring them back

Most major e-publishers now provide RSS (real simple syndication) feeds — essentially automatic summary updates of topics that you choose — in addition to the e-mail alerts they send out on the subjects that they want you to receive.

Because many national strategy-makers and businesses are not aware of the potential of service exports, they do not tap into this growing opportunity. Raising awareness about services is an important first step.