Biblioteca Digital

Este trabalho tem como objetivo analisar a competitividade das exportações brasileiras de manga e de uva no mercado internacional no período de 1989 a 2005. Para tanto, utilizou-se o modelo de Constant Market Share (CMS) e o modelo de Vantagem Comparativa Revelada (VCR) para evidenciar os principais fatores responsáveis pela rápida expansão das exportações nacionais para esses dois produtos, além de realizar uma análise comparativa entre as duas culturas selecionadas. O primeiro modelo busca analisar as causas de variação da quantidade (ou valor) exportada de um produto pelo país em questão em relação ao tempo, gerando três dimensões explicativas para a variação das exportações: o efeito dimensão, o efeito distribuição e o efeito competitividade. O efeito dimensão mostra como o crescimento das exportações mundiais afetou o crescimento das exportações do país analisado. O efeito distribuição refere-se às exportações para países de maior ou menor dinamismo. Por resíduo, descontando-se os demais efeitos temos o termo competitividade.Para a geração dos resultados foi necessária a sub-divisão do período de análise em três grupos trienais: 1989/1990/1991, 1994/1995/1996 e 2003/2004/2005.O modelo de Vantagem Comparativa Revelada parte do pressuposto de que o país em questão tende a se especializar nas exportações de produtos que ofereçam vantagens competitivas. Para tanto...

We develop a model of comparative advantage with monopolistic competition, that incorporates heterogeneous firms and endogenous mark-ups. We analyse how these features vary across countries with different factor endowments, and across markets of different size. In this model we can obtain trade gains via two channels. First, when we open the economy, most productive firms start to export their product, then, they demand more producing factors and wages rises, thus, those firms that are less productive will be forced to stop to produce. Second channel is via endogenous mark-ups, when we open the economy, the competition gets ``tougher', then, mark-ups falls, thus, those firms that are less productive will stop to produce. We also show that comparative advantage works as a ``third channel' of trade gains, because, all trade gains results are magnified in comparative advantage industry of both countries. We also make a numerical exercise to see how endogenous variables of the model vary when trade costs fall.

This paper investigates the relationship between all types of intra-industry trade (IIT) and comparative advantage. The paper finds strong evidence of an inverted-U relationship.The results also suggest that relative autarky costs is a common determinant for any type of IIT, which contradicts the prediction made by theory for separating the determinants of horizontal and vertical IIT.

The paper has two objectives. The first is to discuss whether developing countries can benefit by specializing according to their comparative advantage. The second objective is to discuss if an economy that adopts a free market policy, will in effect achieve greater economic efficiency. The author concludes that specialization according to comparative advantage would indeed benefit a country. He also argues that in an economy ruled by free competition and without governmental interference, market signals and forces are not by themselves sufficient to provide the necessary incentives to producers so that they fully use the available resources, and produce and trade according to comparative advantage.

Active economic policies by developing countries governments to promote growth and industrialization have generally been viewed with suspicion by economists, and for good reasons: past experiences show that such policies have too often failed to achieve their stated objectives. But the historical record also indicates that in all successful economies, the state has always played an important role in facilitating structural change and helping the private sector sustain it across time. This paper proposes a new approach to help policymakers in developing countries identify those industries that may hold latent comparative advantage. It also recommends ways of removing binding constraints to facilitate private firms entry into those industries. The paper introduces an important distinction between two types of government interventions. First are policies that facilitate structural change by overcoming information and coordination and externality issues, which are intrinsic to industrial upgrading and diversification. Such interventions aim to provide information...

It is assumed that added time to export adds cost to and lowers the volume of trade. Time delays may also affect the composition of trade and can disproportionately reduce trade in time-sensitive goods. This paper investigates the validity of these propositions using the World Bank Doing Business database and Enterprise Surveys for 64 developing countries. The authors find that in countries where there is longer time needed to export firms in time-sensitive industries are less likely to become exporters. Moreover, firms that do export have lower export intensities. Their findings imply that time to export is a significant determinant of comparative advantage. For example, consider two industries that have the same export probability and intensity - but differ in time-sensitivity by one standard deviation. Action taken to cut time to export by 50 percent for one industry opens a 6 percentage point difference between the export probabilities of the two industries. In addition, steps to cut time delays increase export intensities by 1.9 percentage points. This impact applies to industries with different productivity levels -- and those in developing countries with different income levels.

This paper analyzes theoretically and empirically the impact of comparative advantage in international trade on fertility. It builds a model in which industries differ in the extent to which they use female relative to male labor and countries are characterized by Ricardian comparative advantage in either female labor or male labor intensive goods. The main prediction of the model is that countries with comparative advantage in female labor intensive goods are characterized by lower fertility. This is because female wages and therefore the opportunity cost of children are higher in those countries. The paper demonstrates empirically that countries with comparative advantage in industries employing primarily women exhibit lower fertility. The analysis uses a geography-based instrument for trade patterns to isolate the causal effect of comparative advantage on fertility.

The authors show that exported products exit the US market sooner if they violate the Heckscher-Ohlin notion of comparative advantage. Crucially, this pattern is stronger when exporting country has a well-developed banking system, measured by a high ratio of bank credit over the GDP. Banks thus push firms away from exports that are facing an uphill battle on a competitive foreign market due to a suboptimal use of the domestic factor endowment. The results imply a disciplining role for bank credit in terminating inefficient trade flows. This constitutes a new channel through which finance improves resource allocation in the real economy.

Since the end of 1996, Chinese agriculture has produced a surplus of many major products, which has led to sharp decreases in farm prices and the stagnation of farmers’ income. To deal with these problems, the Chinese government has called for a ‘strategic adjustment’ in the structures of agriculture and the rural economy. The goals of this strategic adjustment are to meet changing market demands and increase farmers’ incomes by improving efficiency in resource allocation among regions and sub-sectors, and by increasing the variety and improving the quality of farm product. A major component of the strategic adjustment is the restructuring of the grain sector, which still accounts for a lion’s share of the crops sector in general. Re-allocation of the production of each major grain crop among the regions on the basis of regional comparative advantage is likely to increase average yields and decrease average costs. Thus, improved efficiency in resource allocation will bring about increases in farmers’ incomes. Also, since competition in the world commodity market is largely based on price, any significant reduction in China’s grain production costs will improve its position in the world grain market. It is widely agreed that years of government intervention and underdeveloped infrastructure have prevented regional comparative advantages in the grain sector from being realised. For the same reasons...

The family investment hypothesis predicts that credit-constrained immigrant families adopt a household strategy for financing post-migration human capital investment in which the partner with labor market comparative advantage engages in investment activities and the other partner undertakes labor market activities which finance current consumption. We assess this hypothesis by focusing on two issues: first, the extent to which the specialization in the investing versus financing role is based on comparative advantage versus gender, and second, the extent to which credit constraints offer a potential explanation for observed behaviour. Using a unique new Australian data set we find that comparative advantage and gender can be separately identified in migrating families. We find some support for the family investment hypothesis among traditional families (where labor market comparative advantage resides with the male partner) but not among non-traditional families.; no

This study uses Domestic Resource Costs (DRC) as the bases in measuring regional comparative advantage in grain production in China. It reveals that China as a whole is likely to have strong comparative advantage in Japonica rice, sorghum, middle Indica rice, millet, and late Indica rice production. However, at the regional and provincial level the comparative advantage in production of major grain crops varies significantly across China. This result implies that there exists great potential to improve resource allocation and to increase grain production through restructuring of the grain sector.; no

Regional grain flows in China have been expanding with the growth of grain production and the development of grain markets. However, is the current pattern of regional grain flows consistent with regional comparative advantage in grain production in China? This paper examines this question by using a binomial logit model with a discrete dependent variable of provincial net grain flows, and the independent variables of regional comparative advantage indicators and other factors affecting the supply and demand in grain markets. The study reveals that the current pattern of China's regional grain flows is consistent with the regional comparative advantage in grain production, measured by the comparative advantage indicators of Domestic Resource Costs Coefficient (DRCC) and Net Social Profitability (NSP). However, the Efficiency Advantage Indices (EAI), measured by relative grain yield, and the Scale Advantage Indices (SAI), measured by relative grain sown area, are not statistically significant determinants of the observed pattern of regional grain flows in China. This implies that government intervention in grain production is still an obstacle for the Chinese farmers to optimise their grain production mix.; no

This paper explores the regional comparative advantage in grain production in China directly according to production and associated costs. Two groups of indicators are used in the study. The first group of indicators includes Net Social Profitability (NSP) and Domestic Resource Costs (DRC), both measuring the net social welfare gained from one production activity against its opportunity costs at border prices. The second group of indicators includes Efficiency Advantage Indices (EAI), Scale Advantage Indices (SAI) and Aggregated Advantage Indices (AAI), which measuring relative yield and scale advantages in a region. The study reveals that the comparative advantage in main grain crops varies significantly across China. It implies that there exists great potential to improve resource allocation and to increase grain production through restructuring of the grain sector. The study also indicates that China is able to compete in the world market even if it as a whole has comparative disadvantage in producing some crops, as some of its provinces may still have comparative advantage in those crops. This implies that detailed analyses at provincial level are needed in projecting China's grain trade flow in the future.; no

The future development of the Tajik economy will be shaped by its comparative advantage on world markets. Exploiting comparative advantage enables an economy to reap gains from trade. Tajikistan's most important comparative advantage is its hydropower potential, which is far larger than the economy's domestic requirements. Yet, high capital costs of building hydropower plants and the unstable geopolitical situation in the transit region to reach South Asian export markets are constraining the realization of this potential. In the short term, the sector, which provides the greatest opportunity for Tajikistan to diversify its exports, appears to be agro-industry and, to a lesser extent, clothing. For both sectors, the main export market is likely to be the regional market. Tajikistan also has a comparative advantage in labor exports, which it has successfully exploited since the mid-2000s. To harness the full potential for labor exports will require improving the skills base of migrant workers and, in particular...

Pakistan is widely believed to be underperforming as far as its agricultural export potential is concerned. However, analyses to support this allegation are very few, in part due to the lack of easily accessible data. In this paper provide the first necessary step in the analysis of Pakistan's comparative advantage in agricultural export markets. However, little or no analysis has been done that sheds some more light on this issue, in the sense of better specifying in which commodities and which markets Pakistan's comparative advantage is strongest. This paper attempts to start filling that void by quantifying the degree of comparative advantage of Pakistan agricultural export products in major overseas markets. This quantification is a necessary first step in getting a better handle on the factors that may limit the extent to which Pakistan is able to enter markets where it has a comparative advantage. Expansion of Pakistan's share in overseas export markets is crucial for further development of the country's agricultural sector. The main objective of the paper is to identify products where Pakistan has demonstrated comparative advantage...

This paper proposes a new quantitative implementation of Balassa's idea that export composition and revealed comparative advantage inform the relationship between endowments in domestic factors of production and exports. It proposes that the export composition of countries is close to a low-dimensional manifold or "Product Space" within the space of export composition, which has as many dimensions as product lines. The Product Space corresponds to a few latent endowments explaining the structure of the trade matrix. The model uses non-linear techniques to identify the product space from the 2010 export matrix of 128 countries and 61 products, and to estimate the latent factors of endowments by country. It formalizes a concept of latent comparative advantage, which has practical country specific applications, relevant for "trade competitiveness" policies. Compared with classical revealed comparative advantage, the model assesses how well countries are matching their potential implied by the latent variables...

The differences in the levels of financial development between industrial and developing countries are large and persistent. Theoretical and empirical literature has argued that these differences are the source of comparative advantage and could therefore shape trade patterns. This paper points out the reverse link: financial development is influenced by comparative advantage. The authors illustrate this idea using a model in which a country's financial development is an equilibrium outcome of the economy's productive structure: financial systems are more developed in countries with large financially intensive sectors. After trade opening demand for external finance, and therefore financial development, are higher in a country that specializes in financially intensive goods. By contrast, financial development is lower in countries that primarily export goods which do not rely on external finance. The authors demonstrate this effect empirically using data on financial development and export patterns in a panel of 96 countries over the period 1970-99. Using trade data, they construct a summary measure of a country's external finance need of exports and relate it to the level of financial development. In order to overcome the simultaneity problem...

Rice long dominated the agricultural economies of South-East Asia. Given the economic predominance of agriculture, the development of rice production had a significant bearing on the economies in the region. This article explains why the countries of mainland South-East Asia long dominated the international rice market. It quantifies labor productivity in rice production and argues that simple, low-cost and labor-extensive, but low-yielding production technology allowed farmers in mainland South-East Asia to achieve significantly higher levels of labor productivity than in the more densely populated rice-producing areas in South-East Asia and Japan. High levels of labor productivity were a major source of comparative advantage in rice production for Burma, Thailand and Southern Vietnam.

The development of tourism in the past decades and the new destinations and tourist products created for more demanding customers increased the competition between destinations in the tourism market. Based on the principies of sustainable tourism, this research intends to identify how the comparative advantage of Águas de São Pedro, in São Paulo State, known for its attractions, influences its competitiveness. After having revised available literature on competitiveness and sustainability of tourist destinations, the model found to be most appropriate was applied to Águas de São Pedro, chosen due to its unique attributes as to its air quality and mineral waters, as well as due to its high social rating. Results revealed that tourists perceive the destinations' unique attributes. They also indicated the necessity of exploring those attributes based on sustainable principies, in order to become more competitive.; O crescimento do turismo nas últimas décadas e a criação de novos destinos e produtos para uma demanda mais exigente acirraram a concorrência das destinações no mercado turístico. Baseando-se nos princípios da sustentabilidade, esta pesquisa teve como objetivo identificar se a vantagem comparativa de Águas de São Pedro (SP)...

World service exports have grown at a rapid rate over the past few decades. While some countries have benefited from the surge in service exports, others have been left behind. This paper provides a snapshot of South Africa's comparative performance in service exports, using a new measure of revealed comparative advantage, the normalised revealed comparative advantage (NRCA). Countries are ranked according to their performance in 10 service export sectors. South Africa is found to reveal a strong comparative advantage in travel service exports (tourism). A discussion of the travel services sector follows, with historical, theoretical and empirical evidence to support the NRCA findings.