The 2019 Forum on Globalization and Industrialization (FGI) is the fourth edition in a series of annual forums jointly organized by UNIDO, Kiel Centre for Globalization and the Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel). It brings together policymakers, representatives from international organizations, academia and business to discuss the opportunities and challenges for industrialization as a result of countries’ greater participation in global trade and investment flows.
This year’s event is organized under the title “The Future of Global Value Chains: How the Fourth Industrial Revolution Is Changing Global Production Networks”. In the past several decades, integration into global value chains (GVCs) provided developing countries with a strategy for economic growth and job creation. This model is challenged by technological transformations happening at the frontier. The automation of increasingly complex tasks in smart factories could harm the comparative advantage of developing countries that have profited from the outsourcing of labour-intensive activities by multinational companies. At the same time, new technology-enabled business models could present developing countries with opportunities for learning and leapfrogging. These issues are at the core of future policymaking on GVCs and their contribution towards achieving inclusive and sustainable development.
