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on South East Asia |
| By: | Park, Innwon; Park, Soonchan |
| Abstract: | The spaghetti bowl phenomenon expected from the proliferating East Asian regional trade agreements (RTAs) is worrisome. In particular, the complicated web of hub-and-spoke type of overlapping free trade agreements (FTAs) can result in high costs for verifying rules of origin (RoO). As an alternative policy option to avoid the negative effect of trade deflection, customs unions (CUs) should be examined. Most of the theoretical analyses on the formation of CUs highlight stronger positive welfare effects compared to FTAs. However, there is a lack of empirical evidence to support the second best theory of customs unions. This paper is an attempt to fill this gap by applying two methodologies, an ex-ante simulation approach and an ex-post econometric approach. We quantitatively estimate the trade effect of CUs and FTAs by adopting a Gravity regression analysis. In general, we find that a CU is a superior type of RTA to an FTA in terms of creating more intra-union trade. In addition to analyzing the trade effects of RTAs according to type, we quantitatively evaluate the welfare and output effects of CUs for East Asia (an ASEAN+3 CU and a China-Japan-Korea CU) compared to FTAs by applying a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model analysis. The East Asian CUs adopt a system of common external tariffs (CET) based on simple-averaged, import-weighted, consumption-weighted, and minimum rates. Overall, we find that the ASEAN+3 CU with the minimum CET is the most desirable type of RTA for both East Asian member countries and the world economy as a whole. |
| Keywords: | free trade agreements; customs unions; rules of origin; common external tariffs; Gravity; CGE; East Asia; ASEAN+3 |
| JEL: | F15 C68 F13 O53 |
| Date: | 2008–10–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:11301&r=sea |
| By: | Joseph Francis Francois (Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria); Ganeshan Wignaraja |
| Abstract: | The Asian countries are once again focused on options for large, comprehensive regional integration schemes. In this paper we explore the implications of such broad-based regional trade initiatives in Asia, highlighting the bridging of the East and South Asian economies. We place emphasis on the alternative prospects for insider and outsider countries. We work with a global general equilibrium model of the world economy, benchmarked to a projected 2017 sets of trade and production patterns. We also work with gravity-model based estimates of trade costs linked to infrastructure, and of barriers to trade in services. Taking these estimates, along with tariffs, into our CGE model, we examine regionally narrow and broad agreements, all centered on extending the reach of ASEAN to include free trade agreements with combinations of the northeast Asian economies (PRC, Japan, Korea) and also the South Asian economies. We focus on a stylized FTA that includes goods, services, and some aspects of trade cost reduction through trade facilitation and related infrastructure improvements. What matters most for East Asia is that China, Japan, and Korea be brought into any scheme for deeper regional integration. This matter alone drives most of the income and trade effects in the East Asia region across all of our scenarios. The inclusion of the South Asian economies in a broader regional agreement sees gains for the East Asian and South Asian economies. Most of the East Asian gains follow directly from Indian participation. The other South Asian players thus stand to benefit if India looks East and they are a part of the program, and to lose if they are not. Interestingly, we find that with the widest of agreements, the insiders benefit substantively in terms of trade and income while the aggregate impact on outside countries is negligible. Broadly speaking, a pan-Asian regional agreement would appear to cover enough countries, with a great enough diversity in production and incomes, to actually allow for regional gains without substantive third-country losses. However, realizing such potential requires overcoming a proven regional tendency to circumscribe trade concessions with rules of origin, NTBs, and exclusion lists. The more likely outcome, a spider web of bilateral agreements, carries with it the prospect of significant outsider costs (i.e. losses) both within and outside the region. |
| Keywords: | regionalism, Asia FTAs, ASEAN, preferential trade, gravity model of services trade, trade costs and infrastructure |
| JEL: | F13 F17 |
| Date: | 2008–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jku:econwp:2008_13&r=sea |
| By: | Karine Marazyan (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS : UMR8174 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - Paris I) |
| Abstract: | This paper aims at explaining differences in education among foster-children and between foster and biological children in developing countries. Foster-children whose biological parents are alive may provide old-age support for both their host and biological parents. Therefore foster-children have lower returns to education than biological children and should receive less human capital investment in household where both types of children live together. However, in households where foster-children are alone, host parents will over-invest in their education to ensure that the expected old-age support will equal a minimum amount to survive. Using data from Indonesia, we provide some evidence supporting our hypothesis. |
| Keywords: | Household structure, child fostering, sibling rivalry. |
| Date: | 2008–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:paris1:halshs-00293074_v1&r=sea |
| By: | Karine Marazyan (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS : UMR8174 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - Paris I) |
| Abstract: | This paper aims at explaining differences in education among foster-children and between foster and biological children in developing countries. Foster-children whose biological parents are alive may provide old-age support for both their host and biological parents. Therefore foster-children have lower returns to education than biological children and should receive less human capital investment in household where both types of children live together. However, in households where foster-children are alone, host parents will over-invest in their education to ensure that the expected old-age support will equal a minimum amount to survive. Using data from Indonesia, we provide some evidence supporting our hypothesis. |
| Keywords: | Household Structure, Child Fostering, Sibling Rivalry |
| Date: | 2008–06–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:paris1:halshs-00290644_v1&r=sea |
| By: | Chan, Tze-Haw; Khong, Wye Leong Roy |
| Abstract: | Currency crises and financial instability in the 1990s have increased the needs of regional cooperation, hence leading to the proposition of optimal currency area (OCA). But only if shocks are symmetric, the cost of relinquish the flexible monetary policy is to be outweighed by the benefits of forming OCA. To tackle the issue, this paper studies the extent of business cycle correlation and output linkages among fifteen Asia Pacific economies during 1961-2004. The real outputs series which sourced from the Penn World Data were estimated in standardized international dollars to construct business cycles based on the Christiano-Fitzgerald (2003)’s asymmetric band-pass filtering method. On the whole, the selected APEC members (especially ASEANs and NIEs) have achieved some important degree of business cycle co-fluctuations since the 1990s and further enhanced after 1997, most possibly attributed to the improved intra-trading and cross-boarder investments. For the US-Japan-ASEAN5 series, a dynamic analysis was conducted using the Autoregressive Distributed Log bounds test and the Unrestricted Error Correction Model (UECM) representation advanced in Pesaran et al. (2002). Nonetheless, the idiosyncratic and common shocks in ASEAN economies are more identical to the Japanese experience rather than the US’s. The overall finding has signified the brighter likelihood of economic cooperation and regional currency arrangements among APEC members. |
| Keywords: | Business Cycle Correlation; Output linkages; OCA; Asia Pacific; Band-pass Filtering; UECM |
| JEL: | C51 E32 O47 C22 |
| Date: | 2007–12–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:11305&r=sea |
| By: | Sek, Siok Kun; Kapsalyamova, Zhanna |
| Abstract: | The paper undertakes a comparative empirical analysis on the effects of shocks on domestic prices in four Asian countries before and after the financial crisis of 1997. We apply two different estimation methodologies, namely a structural VAR and a single equation approach. The results of the two methods are consistent, although the magnitude of the elasticities of the exchange rate pass-through are different due to the inclusion of different variables, lag terms and different assumptions made in both methods. The results show that the degrees of the exchange rate pass-through are different across countries and over time. In most cases, the pass-through rates are incomplete. The degree of the exchange rate pass-through is the highest on import prices, moderate on PPI and is the lowest on CPI. In some cases, the pass-through rates on CPI are even negative. The effect of the import price shock is stronger as compared to that of the exchange rate shock in determining the movement of the domestic prices in these countries. Trade openness has a weak correlation with the degree of the exchange rate pass-through. |
| Keywords: | domestic prices; exchange rate pass-through; SVAR; single equation approach |
| JEL: | C32 F41 C22 |
| Date: | 2008–08–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:11130&r=sea |
| By: | Canegrati, Emanuele |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the presence of Granger-causality amongst world market indices: S&P 500, Dow Jones Industrial Average, Eurostoxx 50, Nikkei, FTSE 100, from January 2nd 1987 to October 17th 2008. Using daily market returns I performed a Granger-causality test, based on the Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model, in order to detect the causalities amongst indices. Different sub-samples were considered, which take into account the distinction between bearish and bullish phases of the markets. Results show that there is high Granger-causality amongst stock returns in every phase of financial markets, but that a real market index leader does not exist, except for Nikkei and Eurostoxx in the third quartile. |
| Keywords: | Granger-causality; Asian stock markets; market indices; VAR |
| JEL: | G14 G11 G15 F36 |
| Date: | 2008–10–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:11292&r=sea |
| By: | Ziya Öniş (Koc University); İsmail Emre Bayram |
| Abstract: | This article assesses the recent performance of the Turkish economy, questioning whether the currently observed unusual boom conditions will lead to a process of sustainable growth. The latest phase of Turkish neo-liberal transformation in the post-2001 era is placed in a broader historical and global context; at the same time, the performance of the economy in recent years is compared with that of other key emerging markets, based on selected macroeconomic indicators. Utilizing the East Asian experience as the principal benchmark for comparison, this paper examines whether Turkey is on its way to accomplishing tiger-like development performance. Given the current challenges to sustainable growth, we conclude that it is premature to suggest that the impressive performance of the recent years will lead to durable success and tiger-like performance. While the focus is on the Turkish experience, the paper also probes the very nature of tiger-like performance itself, highlighting the fact that in setting standards for exceptional economic performance we need to extend our horizons beyond high rates of economic growth sustained over time, to broader indicators of social, political and human development. |
| Keywords: | Turkey, hyper-growth, East Asian tigers, emerging markets, human development, democratization. |
| JEL: | O11 O5 O57 |
| Date: | 2008–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:koc:wpaper:0805&r=sea |
| By: | Berisha-Krasniqi, Valdete; Bouet, Antoine; Laborde, David; Mevel, Simon |
| Abstract: | "The benefits least-developed countries (LDCs) can draw from a multilateral trade reform as designed by the modalities made public in May 2008 are negligible, and some countries will even face adverse effects. World Trade Organization (WTO) negotiators should make a supplementary effort in favor of the poorest countries. The Duty-Free Quota-Free (DFQF) Initiative moves in the right direction, but it should be extended not only from a product point of view—with a 100, not 97, percent application—but also in terms of geographic coverage. This initiative has to be supported by both Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and BrIC (Brazil, India, and China) countries. It is in the interests of Asian LDCs to prioritize full openness of OECD markets (a 100-percent DFQF regime) and full access to the U.S. market in particular, while African countries will draw more benefits from a geographic extension of this regime to BrIC countries." from Text |
| Keywords: | Trade reform, Doha Development Agenda, Least developed countries, World Trade Organization Developing countries, |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fpr:resbrf:14&r=sea |
| By: | Headey, Derek; Bezemer, Dirk; Hazell, Peter B. |
| Abstract: | "Contrary to conventional economic theories, the relationship between income growth and the share of the population within the rural or agricultural sector is extremely diverse, even among regions starting from similar levels of development, such as Asia and Africa. The pattern in developing Asia is characterized by fast growth and slow urbanization, primarily as the result of labor-intensive agricultural growth and strong farm–nonfarm linkages. But for all its success to date, Asia appears to be increasingly vulnerable to rising inequality and jobless growth patterns. Africa presents a divergent pattern of slow growth with rapid urbanization stemming from urban-biased policies, low rural population density, and high rates of population growth. But whereas Africa's path of urbanization without growth presents problems like unemployment, congestion, and food-price inflation, it may also provide new development possibilities through greater political empowerment, lower fertility rates, and agglomeration externalities. The paper concludes with a discussion of how development strategies can address these agricultural exit problems." from authors' abstract |
| Keywords: | economic growth, structural change, Urbanization, agricultural exits, rural to urban migration, rural non-farm employment, Inequality, employment, agglomeration externalities, |
| Date: | 2008 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fpr:ifprid:802&r=sea |
| By: | Dominique Guegan (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - CNRS : UMR8174 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - Paris I); Cyril Caillault (FORTIS Investments - Fortis investments) |
| Abstract: | Using non-parametric (copulas) and parametric models, we show that the bivariate distribution of an Asian portfolio is not stable along all the period under study. We suggest several dynamic models to compute two market risk measures, the Value at Risk and the Expected Shortfall: the RiskMetric methodology, the Multivariate GARCH models, the Multivariate Markov-Switching models, the empirical histogram and the dynamic copulas. We discuss the choice of the best method with respect to the policy management of bank supervisors. The copula approach seems to be a good compromise between all these models. It permits taking financial crises into account and obtaining a low capital requirement during the most important crises. |
| Keywords: | Value at Risk - Expected Shortfall - Copula - RiskMetrics - Risk management -GARCH models - Switching models. |
| Date: | 2008–03–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:paris1:halshs-00185374_v1&r=sea |