Economic Resilience under the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework Supply Chain Agreement: Treading Between Geoeconomic Ambitions and World Trade Organization Compatibility?

The resilience of international supply chains is increasingly becoming a policy objective within international trade law-making. Unilaterally, States have resorted to a myriad of trade tools to achieve this objective, including subsidizing domestic industries, facilitating critical minerals, and imposing tariffs on dominant supplying States to encourage supply diversification. In this context, the IPEF Supply Chain Agreement is the first major international trade agreement primarily aimed at achieving regional supply chain resilience. This Research Note explores the WTO compatibility of the economic interventions that underpin the Supply Chain Agreement’s ‘managed trade’ approach to supply chain resilience. First, it outlines the firm centred governance approach that is central to supply chain management under the Supply Chain Agreement. Second, it explores the likely challenges and justifications of the envisaged interventions under GATT 1994 and Agreement on Safeguards. Finally, it offers broader reflections on the potential role of the WTO to shape cooperative supply chain governance interventions.