Consultancy & Policy

Trade policy analysis for governments, firms, and institutions.

What I do

Quantitative trade policy analysis — tariff, non-tariff, and trade agreement impact assessment using firm- and product-level data
Export strategy and market access diagnostics for firms and industry bodies
Country and sector trade exposure assessments
Expert commentary, briefings, and evidence submissions for policymakers and journalists

Who I work with

Government trade and economics departments, international organisations, industry associations, and research centres — including the Kyiv School of Economics Foreign Trade Research Center (Trade+) and Aston Business School.

How to engage

The fastest way to reach me is email: shepotylo@gmail.com.

Parliamentary evidence

The UK’s economic security (Business and Trade Committee, ECO0009; with Karen Jackson). Argues that security assurances reduce uncertainty and encourage commerce, so aligning security and trade policy — as NATO membership and EU economic integration did — yields outsized benefits.
Global Competitiveness and Trade in Services (House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee, “A creative future”; with Jun Du and co-authors). Evidence on UK creative-industry services exports and how Brexit affected them.
UK-US trade negotiations (House of Commons International Trade Committee, 2020, UST0062; with Jun Du and Uzoamaka Nduka). Written evidence to the inquiry into the prospective UK-US trade agreement.
The future UK-EU relationship on professional and business services (House of Lords European Union Committee, October 2021; with Jun Du). Written evidence on UK services trade with the EU after Brexit.
Written evidence to a parliamentary committee (with Jun Du). Inquiry title to be confirmed.
Written evidence to a parliamentary committee (with Jun Du, Mustapha Douch and Uzoamaka Nduka). Inquiry title to be confirmed.
Written evidence to a parliamentary committee Inquiry title and co-authors to be confirmed.

Selected policy work

Title	Description
Ukraine’s Integration into the EU’s Digital Single Market	FREE Network Policy Brief, 2021. With Pavlo Iavorskyi and Svitlana Taran. Show abstract We assess how Ukraine’s integration into the EU’s Digital Single Market would affect EU-Ukraine bilateral trade and Ukraine’s GDP growth. The main gains would come from reducing cross-border regulatory barriers to EU-Ukraine digital trade and accelerating the development of Ukraine’s digital economy in line with EU standards. Enhanced regulatory and digital connectivity is projected to raise Ukraine’s exports of goods to the EU by 11.8–17% and of services by 7.6–12.2%.
Popular Support For Trade Agreements And Partner Country Characteristics	Economic Inquiry, 2021. With Tom Coupé. Show abstract Using quasi-experimental survey data collected immediately before and after the November 2016 US presidential election, we test how the election of Donald Trump affected Europeans’ willingness to sign a trade and investment agreement with the United States. The election outcome produced an immediate, sizeable negative shift in Europeans’ image of the United States, but no corresponding drop in their willingness to sign a trade agreement — popular support for a deal proved more durable than opinion of the partner country itself.
Non-tariff measures, quality and exporting: evidence from microdata	European Review of Agricultural Economics, 2020. With Veronika Movchan and Volodymyr Vakhitov. Show abstract Domestic non-tariff measures influence firms’ production and import decisions. We introduce non-tariff measures into a model with heterogeneous firms, where they raise production costs but also act as a positive demand shifter — leaving their net effect on the extensive and intensive margins of trade ambiguous. Testing the model’s predictions on Ukrainian food-processing firms in 2008–2013: more SPS regulation on upstream inputs is associated with exports of higher-quality products, while mandatory certification has a negative effect on quality by limiting firms’ access to new technology and equipment.
How to Intensify and Diversify Ukrainian Exports? The Case of Bilateral Trade with Germany	FREE Network / KSE Policy Brief, 2019. Show abstract Ukraine and Germany sit at different levels of economic development but are both highly open to trade, leaving room for gains from deeper bilateral trade — yet Ukrainian exports to Germany remain insufficiently diversified and under-exploited along both the extensive and intensive margins. Analysing which sectors of the German economy depend most on imports and where Ukrainian manufacturers could plausibly compete, we identify 67 product groups most promising for expanding Ukrainian exports to Germany, aligned with the priority sectors in Ukraine’s Export Strategy.
Post-Brexit trade survival: Looking beyond the European Union	Economic Modelling, 2018. With Karen Jackson. Show abstract We explore the welfare implications of a new EU-UK relationship alongside major trade policy initiatives, evaluating five Brexit scenarios that vary in their assumptions about a UK-EU deal, TTIP, and new free trade agreements with the US or Commonwealth countries, tracking welfare changes over two decades. The impact of Brexit is negative under every scenario, with losses smallest under a soft Brexit and worse if TTIP proceeds — underscoring the value of large-bloc membership. Losses occur gradually and can be partly offset by new trade agreements, but a hard Brexit should be avoided to minimise them.