The Course aims at providing students with the following achievements:

Knowledge and understanding: students acquire advanced knowledge on the theoretical and applied linkages between international trade, trade policies and economic performance and living conditions in developing countries. This knowledge includes full understanding of the distinction between long and short-run trends, including regional variations, as well as the impacts of the major policy shifts which have taken place over the last four decades on the living conditions in developing countries;

Applying knowledge and understanding: students will be equipped with the tools necessary to practice as a working economist, especially as they apply to the problems of low-income countries. These tools include an applied understanding of key economic concepts, the ability to work with and interpret economic models, the understanding of the most relevant contemporary debates in development (e.g., trade and poverty, trade and vulnerability, trade and food security; trade and GVCs; aid effectiveness, etc.), the theoretical underpinnings of the different positions, and their policy implications;

Critical skills: students will be able to understand the most relevant economic models as well as to retrieve and make sense of available empirical data to interpret contemporaneous phenomena by making appropriate reference to the main economic models on trade and development; 

Communication skills: students will be involved in in-class activities and presentations meant to strengthen their ability to present arguments and information on the topic in both written and verbal form. Students should be able to summarise and present the main points from a mass of data, to highlight and present in a cogent manner the main issues in debates, and to be able to clearly present, selecting and applying appropriate theoretical models;

Learning skills: students learning abilities include the capacity to keep track of the most relevant contemporary debates by becoming familiar with the appropriate sources for different information (included the most relevant scientific journals in the field) as well as to collect and interpret data on developing countries making reference to the main sources and typologies of data available at the international level.