The precautionary principle and its approach to risk analysis and quarantine related to the trade of marine ornamental fishes in Brazil

The objective of this study was to employ the precautionary principle in import risk analysis (IRA) and quarantine in the trade of marine ornamental fishes (MOF). The analysis focused on the example of Brazil, as it imports and exports these fishes, in amounts that are globally significant. These processes, since their collection in nature, may expose the fish to stress, which may lead to the development of diseases. The legislation that regulates IRA and quarantine is derived from the Ministries of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply and Fisheries and Aquaculture. The quarantine of MOF in Brazil is not undertaken by government agencies, but by commercial establishments that are registered with the Ministries, and is way too short. According to the data obtained, the precautionary approach is not applied at all in this trade, as scientific information is not contemplated by the legislation, and law is not enforced.

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Exchange rate volatility and fluctuations in the extensive margin of trade

The existing evidence for exporters׳ entry and exit in response to exchange rate movements is based on either low frequency data or a sample with large devaluations. Using quarterly data of U.S. bilateral trade with 99 countries, this study provides new evidence that the extensive margin of trade fluctuates over the business cycle. First, I show that the extensive margin of exports to the U.S. and the extensive margin of imports from the U.S. are more volatile than the output of almost all trading partners. Next, I find that fixing exchange rates with the U.S. dollar, having a free trade agreement with the U.S., and an increase in country size is significantly associated with the stability of the pattern of trade with the U.S.

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Trade in goods and services

The indicator comprises sales of goods and services as well as barter transactions or goods exchanged as part of gifts or grants between residents and non-residents. It is measured in million USD and percentage of GDP for net trade and also annual growth for exports and imports.

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OECD: Trade in goods and services forecast

Trade in goods and services forecast is defined as the projected value of change in ownership of material resources and services between one economy and another. Projections are based on an assessment of the economic climate in individual countries and the world economy, using a combination of model-based analyses and expert judgement. The indicator comprises net trade, imports and exports and export market growth. Net trade is the value of exports minus the value of imports; imports and exports are the value of goods and services imported or exported from other economies; export market growth measures the demand for a country’s exports constructed as a weighted average of import growth in all export destinations using export shares as weights. This indicator is measured in USD for net trade and in USD, 2010 prices for exports, imports and export market growth.

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Input-trade liberalization, export prices and quality upgrading

This paper explores the impact of input trade liberalization on imported input and exported product prices. Using Chinese transaction data for 2000–2006, we capture causal effects between exogenous input tariff reductions and within firm changes in HS6-traded product prices. For identification, we make use of a natural control group of firms that are exempted from paying tariffs. Both imported input and export prices rise. The effect on export prices is specific to firms sourcing inputs from developed economies and exporting output to high-income countries. Results are consistent with a scenario within which firms exploit the input tariff cuts to access high-quality inputs in order to quality-upgrade their exports.

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Aggregated and disaggregated import demand in China

This paper re-estimates both the aggregated and disaggregated import demand functions for China. We consider six groups of goods for the disaggregated imports based on the Standard International Trade Classification (SITC). The empirical findings from the dynamic ordinary least squares and autoregressive distributed lag regressions indicate that there are positive effects of the domestic income on imports. Second, contrary to theory but in line with previous studies, we obtain negative coefficients for the real effective exchange rate—a real appreciation in the Renminbi (RMB) would reduce import demand. Third, the period of the great global recession is negatively associated with the import demand in China. Fourth, the perception of tail risk negatively affects demand for the aggregated imports and five of six groups for the disaggregated imports. Fifth, the exchange rate reform had a positive impact on the aggregated imports, but our estimations report mixed results for the disaggregated imports. Finally, our results indicate that there is no aggregation bias for import demand in China.

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Trade, import competition and productivity growth in the food industry

Melitz and Ottaviano’s (2008) firm-heterogeneity model predicts that trade liberalization induces a selection process from low to high productivity firms, which translates to an industry productivity growth. A similar firms’ selection effect is induced by market size. In this paper, these predictions are tested across 25 European countries and 9 food industries, over the 1995–2008 period. Using different dynamic panel estimators we find strong support for the model predictions, namely that an increase in import penetration is systematically positively related to productivity growth. The results are robust to measurement issues in productivity, controlling for market size, country and sector heterogeneities, and for the endogeneity of import competition. Interestingly, this positive relationship is almost exclusively driven by competition in final products coming from developed (especially EU-15) countries suggesting that EU food imports are closer substitutes for domestic production than non-EU imports. These results have some potentially interesting policy implications.

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Depletion of non-renewable resources imported by China

This paper presents a model of resource management for resource exporters to analyse how the persistence of resource intensive growth in China should affect the depletion of non-renewable resources imported by China.

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Philippines Foreign Trade Statistics – 1st semester 2014

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Rwanda Trade Statistics

Monthly imports 2014
Monthly exports 2014

Communication Flows in International Economic Law

The recent WTO Appellate Body’s decision on European Communities – Measures Prohibiting the Importation and Marketing of Seal Products (Seal Products case) highlights the sensitivity surrounding the invocation of public morals to restrict imports based on the welfare concerns for animals with respect to imports of animal products. The ‘public moral’ exception has been in the books of the multilateral trading system for some time and slowly but surely the WTO dispute settlement is being engaged in clarifying the parameters of the ‘public morals’ exception in international trade.

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Bilateral tariff rates in international trade

Abstract
In this paper, we examined back-and-forth international transactions through tariff reduction by estimating modified gravity equations for finished goods and intermediate goods separately. Our main findings are as follows. Exports of finished machinery products are negatively associated with not only the importer’s tariff rates on finished machinery products but also the exporter’s tariff rates on machinery parts. Similarly, exports of machinery parts are negatively associated with not only the importer’s tariff rates on machinery parts but also the exporter’s tariff rates on finished machinery products. These results imply that tariff reduction in only one production process in an industry has the potential to drastically change the magnitude of trade in the whole industry.

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Rising China, anxious Asia? A Bayesian New Keynesian view / Chin-Yoong WONG, Yoke-Kee ENG , Muzafar Shah HABIBULLAH

Should Asia feel anxious about China’s expansion? We look for the answer through the Bayesian estimation of a two-country New Keynesian model of production fragmentation covering ten Asian economies, including China. The estimates show that vis-à-vis China, the developed Asia has a more fragmented production structure with higher domestic value-added embodied in intermediates traded with China whereas the developing Asian production chains are equally if not less fragmented with more foreign value-added. We also find that China’s expansion made possible by favorable demand and price shocks benefits all Asian neighbors. Expansion driven by total factor productivity improvement, however, lifts the aggregate value-added in the developing Asia but not in the developed Asia, unless the shocks symmetrically originate in both China and the developed Asia. Fixing the regional currencies irrevocably to the U.S. dollar amplifies the effect of China’s productivity improvements, although it is nearly irrelevant for responses to other types of shocks. We conclude that production fragmentation and symmetry in shock are the keys to the answers of this question.

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How Do Technical Barriers to Trade Affect China’s Imports? / Xiaohua Bao

This research adopts the heterogeneous-firm approach to analyze how technical barriers to trade (TBT) imposed by China affect its imports. The empirical analysis is based on a sample covering China’s import control measures (e.g. TBT, tariff, license and quota) of all harmonized system (HS) 4-digit products during the period 1998–2006. A modified two-stage gravity model is used to correct for Heckman selection bias and firm heterogeneity bias. This paper finds that, in general, TBT reduce China’s import probability with potential trade partners, but raise the import values with existing trade partners. Further evidence shows that the TBT effects on trade value remain quite stable. However, the TBT effects on trade probability vary a great deal across industries and countries in different time periods.

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Trade elasticities in transition countries / Almira Buzaushina

Abstract:
Trade elasticities play a crucial role in translating economic analysis of external adjustment issues into macroeconomic policy. Trade demand elasticities allow policy makers to draw important conclusions about exchange rate misalignments or trade balance changes. This paper endeavors to bring transition countries, namely those from Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, into the universe of estimated price and activity elasticities of trade volumes. The estimated results imply that the traditional ‘Marshall-Lerner’ condition is not satisfied for transition countries. The estimated price elasticities of export and import demands perform fairly well in predicting out-of-sample changes in trade balance ratios for a broad set of transition countries. In the long run, however, exports and imports are mainly driven by income changes.

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The Trade Effects of US Anti-dumping Actions against China Post-WTO Entry / Guobing Shen and Xiaolan Fu

Since China’s entry into the WTO, US anti-dumping (AD) actions against China have increased, particularly with respect to multiple petitions. Distinguishing between US single and multiple petitions, we examine the trade effects of US AD actions against China based on an unbalanced panel of quarterly trade data. The results show that a US single petition investigation greatly restrains US imports of the filed products from China but also causes more significant import diversion from non-named countries. In the short run, a preliminary AD duty imposed on China via a US multiple petition not only restrains US imports of the filed products from China but also prevents trade diversion from non-named countries. In the long run, a final AD duty on China resulting from a US multiple petition creates a larger destructive effect on China and causes US import diversion from non-named countries. Thus, a final AD duty imposed on China following a US multiple petition not only harms China’s exports but also fails to help the US achieve import substitution. Furthermore, we have been able to reveal the negative trade effect of a preliminary AD duty even in cases where the ultimate decision is not to impose a final duty.

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Protection and Performance / Joseph Francois and Miriam Manchin

Abstract:
We examine the linkages between import policy and export performance, extending classic macroeconomic trade effects to more recent concepts from the modern literature on gravity models. We also examine these effects empirically with a panel of global and bilateral trade spanning 15 years. Our emphasis on the role of import policy (i.e. tariffs) of exporters as an explanation of trade volumes contrasts with the recent emphasis on importer policy in the gravity literature. It also reinforces the growing body of evidence on the importance of economic environmental (policy and infrastructure) conditions in explaining relative export performance and is in line with the literature on global value chains.

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Preferential Market Access Design: Evidence and Lessons from African Apparel Exports to the United States and the European Union / Jaime de Melo and Alberto Portugal-Perez.

The least developed countries rely on preferential market access. To benefit from these preferences, proof of sufficient transformation must be provided to customs in importing countries by meeting the rules of origin requirements. These rules of origin are complicated and burdensome to exporters in least developed countries. Since 2001, under the U.S. Africa Growth Opportunity Act (AGOA), 22 African countries that export apparel to the United States have been able to use fabric of any origin (single transformation) and still meet the criterion for preferential access (the so-called Special Rule). In contrast, the EU has continued to require yarn to be woven into fabric and then made into apparel in the same country (double transformation). Panel estimates for the 1996–2004 period exploit this quasi-experimental change in the design of preferences. Estimates show that this simplification contributed to an increase in export volume of approximately 168 percent for the top seven beneficiaries, or approximately four times as much as the 44 percent growth effect from the initial preferential access under the AGOA without single transformation. This change in design was also important for diversity in apparel exports because the number of export varieties grew more rapidly under the AGOA special regime.

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On the twin deficits hypothesis and the import intensity in transition countries / Hubert Gabrisch

This article aims to explain the increasing deficits in the trade and current account balances of three post-transition countries–Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland–by testing two hypotheses: the twin deficit hypothesis and increasing import intensity of export production. The method uses co-integration and related techniques to test for a long-run causal relationship between the fiscal and external deficits of three post-transition countries in Central and Eastern Europe. In addition, an import intensity model is tested by applying OLS and GMM. All the results reject the Twin Deficits Hypothesis. Instead, the results demonstrate that specific transition factors such as net capital flows and, probably, a high import intensity of exports affect the trade balance.

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The 40th Anniversary of Korea-India Amity: Evaluation and Prospects of the Trade Sector / Woong Lee, Young Chul Song, Jungmi Lee

The year 2013 represents the 40th anniversary of the establishment of Korea-India diplomatic relations. This report is prepared to evaluate the achievements and the future challenges in Korea-India economic cooperation. The study analyzes trade relations using all available sources from the 1970s until today as the trade sector is the most influential among all sectors between Korea and India in terms of their bilateral economic cooperation.

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