Trade agreements and trade flows: Estimating the effect of free trade agreements on trade flows with an application to the European Union – Gulf Cooperation Council Free Trade Agreement

This paper examines the proposed EU-GCC FTA, a free trade agreement (FTA) between the EU and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), which includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The paper first takes a fresh look at the methodology generally applied to analysis of potential FTAs, and then uses its own enhanced methodology to analyse the proposed EU-GCC FTA.