This theme group will develop the notion of decent trade and help make it operational by exploring innovative approaches to fostering fair market access,decent work as well as environmental sustainability and suggesting concrete ways and means of facilitating their implementation. It is the ambition of the theme group to move beyond mere discussions about desirable objectives to the identification—and possibly implementation—of feasible policy initiatives in support of the realization of decent trade. This will include an analysis of the role of voluntary, market-based initiatives promoting decent trade, as well as an assessment of the relationship between mandatory and voluntary approaches to realizing the decent trade agenda.
Among others, the theme group will address the following questions:

• What exactly does the “decent trade” agenda entail, and what is its value add compared to other prominent approaches in debates about international trade?
• How does the “decent trade” agenda relate to existing intergovernmental agreements?
• What are suitable approaches to realizing decent trade, both at the national as well as the international level?
• What are the respective potentials and limits of voluntary as well as mandatory approaches to realizing decent trade? To what extent are voluntary and mandatory approaches relates, to what extent do they build upon each other?