I'm not making a statement about whether free trade lifts people out of poverty. Sometimes it has the potential to do that. Free trade has the potential to do lots of good stuff, but we need to make sure governments have appropriate regulatory powers to protect their citizens when bad things happen: when there are import surges, when there are price fluctuations and when there are unexpected consequences that come along with more open markets.
To give you some concrete examples, there are already explicit carve-outs in existing trade agreements that make tools available to governments to protect human life, plant life, the natural environment and so on. There should also be explicit carve-outs available to promote gender equality if a government so chooses.
Please don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying there is no potential for free trade to have a positive impact on poverty. In fact, I would make the opposite argument. However, we need better policy, and to have better policy we need better data. We need better collaboration with our trade partners and with the international organizations to which we belong.
Of course, a major priority of the current government is women's economic empowerment. That's only a very small part of the story that, I think, is important; the work we're doing on women's economic empowerment needs to look at a bigger picture of who the women we seek to empower are.