International R&D Spillovers: Trade,FDI, and Information Technology as Spillover Channels*

With the rapid pace of economic integration, the productivity of a country depends not only on domestic R&D, but also on foreign R&D through technology diffusion across countries. The advancement of information technology (IT) has made the international transmission of knowledge faster and more efficient, providing an important channel for international R&D spillovers. This paper investigates three channels of international R&D spillovers: trade, FDI, and information technology. Applying panel cointegration and dynamic OLS analysis to the data for 21 OECD countries plus Israel during the period from 1981 to 1998, we find that bilateral trade remains an important conduit for international R&D spillovers. Although bilateral FDI is found to be positively related to international R&D spillovers, their impact on productivity growth is relatively small. We also find that the development of information technology has played a more important role in international R&D spillovers and productivity growth in recent years.     

R&D Policies and Endogenous Growth: A Dynamic General Equilibrium Analysis of the Case for Canada*

This paper utilizes a general equilibrium R&D model of endogenous growth via increasing capital variety to examine the impact of alternative policies on productivity and economic growth. The model is calibrated using data from the Canadian economy. Findings reveal that direct incentives such as subsidies to R&D activities would have the highest productivity impact on the Canadian economy, that an increase in subsidies to the users of R&D capital (output) would have a positive but smaller impact, and trade liberalization would have minimal effects on productivity growth via its impact on international R&D spillovers.     

Trade and the Transmission of Technology

This paper integrates earlier studies on the link of productivity and research and development (R&D) in different industries of a closed economy with the more recent emphasis on R&D-driven growth and international trade in open economies. In this framework, technology in the form of product designs is transmitted to other industries, both domestically as well as internationally, through trade in differentiated intermediate goods. I present empirical results based on a new industry-level data set that covers more than 65 percent of the worlds manufacturing output and most of the worlds R&D expenditures between 1970 and 1991. The analysis considers productivity effects from R&D in the domestic industry itself, from R&D in other domestic industries, as well as in the same and other foreign industries. I estimate strong productivity effects both from own R&D spending and R&D conducted elsewhere. The contribution of R&D in the industry itself is about 50 percent in this sample. Domestic R&D in other industries is the source of 30 percent of the productivity increases, and the remaining 20 percent are due to R&D expenditures in foreign industries.     

International Transmission of Technology and Trade: The Role of Cross-country Heterogeneity

In the framework where the channel of international transmission of technology is trade in intermediate inputs, this paper investigates the role of heterogeneities across countries. In particular, this paper analyzes how cross-country differences in production structure, national innovative capacity, and absorptive capacity affect the scope and magnitude of international R&D spillovers on productivity. The study is based on the industry-level data set that covers eight OECD countries from 1970 to 1995. It finds that accounting for cross-country differences in each of production structure (using country-specific input–output relations) and national innovative capacity (using patents granted per R&D investment) yields significantly different spillover effects than previous studies. This suggests that the effect of international R&D spillovers depends on both production structure and the pattern of international trade. Further, it finds the absorptive capacity of a country is positively related to spillovers.     

The pattern of international patenting and technology diffusion

The article focuses on the impact of R&D expenditure on labour productivity using international patent applications as a technology diffusion indicator. Considering the relationship between research and productivity, the pattern of international patenting reflects the channel between the source and the destination of transferred technology. Accounting for nonstationarity and cointegration, I find that patent-related foreign R&D spillovers are present for a panel of 18 OECD countries. Moreover, nonG7 OECD countries benefit more from foreign rather than domestic R&D activities. Estimates also show that there is no significant spillover effect from bilateral trade, but confirm the impact of FDI on domestic labour productivity.     

Technological convergence, R&D, trade and productivity growth

This paper analyses productivity growth in a panel of 14 United Kingdom manufacturing industries since 1970. Innovation and technology transfer provide two potential sources of productivity growth for a country behind the technological frontier. We examine the roles played by research and development (R&D), international trade, and human capital in stimulating each source of productivity growth. Technology transfer is statistically significant and quantitatively important. While R&D raises rates of innovation, international trade enhances the speed of technology transfer. Human capital primarily affects output through private rates of return (captured in our index of labour quality) rather than measured TFP.     

R&D policy with layers of economic integration

This paper examines whether the optimal unilateral R&D policy for an open economy is a subsidy or a tax. It constructs a general equilibrium model with three successive layers of international integration: (a) trade in goods, (b) trade in technologies with international R&D spillovers and (c) internationally-coordinated R&D policy. Trade in technologies introduces the possibility that an R&D subsidy will have such strong, negative terms-of-trade effects that it harms domestic welfare. Numerical simulations of the OECD show this is a possibility for the US and Japan. With international R&D spillovers a domestic R&D subsidy may reduce domestic innovation.     

Catching-up and Regulation in a Two-Sector Small Open Economy

Deregulation is often aimed at reducing mark-up pricing in technologically stagnant sheltered sectors. The paper shows that this may decrease the process of catching-up and welfare since it shifts resources away from R&D-intensive tradables sectors. Catching-up and deregulation are analyzed in an R&D-based growth model that allows for international capital mobility, trade, and spillovers. Knowledge spillovers raise the productivity of R&D in the exposed sector which results in catching-up. In the long run, the economy grows at the exogenous world growth rate. Capital mobility speeds up convergence. Temporary shocks have long-lasting effects as the economy exhibits hysteresis.     

海外研发、贸易摩擦与创新绩效：来自中国高科技上市公司的经验证据

海外研发被视为后发国家实现技术赶超的有效路径,现有文献基于经贸自由化的前置条件证实了海外研发提升创新绩效的反哺作用。然而在全球贸易保护主义抬头的背景下,资源要素的自由流动愈发困难,海外研发能否发挥应有的作用尚不得而知。为此,基于中国高科技上市公司的数据,本文探索了中美贸易摩擦如何影响中国企业的海外研发绩效。研究发现,中美贸易摩擦非但没有侵蚀中国企业的海外研发绩效,反而产生倒逼效应,推动中国企业提升投资效率并积累国际投资经验,继而增强了海外研发的反哺作用。通过区分海外研发目的地,本文进一步发现倒逼效应在赴非美国家的样本中更显著。赴美研发受到贸易摩擦的冲击更为直接,稀释了提升投资效率和积累国际化经验所带来的收益。研究结论深化了国际商务理论关于贸易保护和壁垒如何影响跨国企业投资绩效的相关研究,为中国企业在高度不确定的投资环境下如何充分释放海外研发的潜能提供启示。     

R&D spillovers, information technology and telecommunications, and productivity in ASIA and the OECD

This paper examines the role research and development (R&D) plays in technology progress for a sample of OECD and Asian economies from 1980 to 1995. An empirical model is estimated which relates total factor productivity to domestic and foreign R&D activity, trade, and information technology and telecommunications (ITT). Model estimates confirm a positive relationship between national productivity and R&D activity exists in the long run. Further, the benefits of R&D can spillover countries through trade, in particular, trade in ITT equipment.     

国际贸易、R&D溢出和生产率增长

本文采用6种计算外国R&D资本的方法和国际R&D溢出回归方法,首次就国际R&D溢出对中国工业行业的技术进步增长、技术效率增长和全要素生产率增长的影响作了实证分析。我们从这6种方法的比较中发现:当采用有缺陷的两种方法时,得到国际R&D溢出系数显著为负或者溢出系数为正,但不显著的结论;而采用其他的四种方法,能得到国际R&D溢出系数显著为正的结论。因此,从计算方法本身及其结论的比较来看,通过国际贸易渠道的R&D溢出促进了中国工业行业的技术进步、技术效率及全要素生产率增长的结论更可靠。同时发现在大部分情况下国内本行业R&D与其他行业R&D对行业技术进步、技术效率和全要素生产率的增长起阻碍作用。因此,加强与R&D投入比重较高的发达国家的国际贸易以及提高国内自身的R&D效率显得很有必要。     

Does productivity in Africa benefit from advanced countries’ R&D?

This study employs dynamic ordinary least squares and panel co-integration to estimate advanced countries’ R&D spillover effects on labour productivity in 28 Sub-Saharan African countries over the period 1992–2011. Results show that African countries that import and receive (technical and non-technical) development aid from advanced countries experience an increase in labour productivity, suggesting that trade and aid are transmitters of foreign R&D. However, the extent to which labour productivity responds to R&D spillovers varies based on the country of origin, where spillovers from the USA have a greater impact compared to those from other advanced countries.     

Trade-related R&D Spillovers in Vietnamese Manufacturing

ABSTRACT

This study aims to examine how Vietnamese manufacturing could benefit from R&D investment locally and from OECD countries through trade during a period marked with major trade liberalisations. Using the industry-level data during 2000–2009, it finds that the foreign R&D has accounted for the most part of the R&D spillovers in the sector, with a larger proportion earning from the other foreign industries’ R&D. The domestic industries’ own R&D has improved the sector’s total factor productivity, but in a relatively smaller magnitude compared to the foreign sources. In examining the localised effects of R&D spillovers in Vietnamese manufacturing, the results reiterate the important roles of trade-embedded foreign R&D spillovers from Japan, the US, South Korea, and Germany in the sector’s total factor productivity growth. These findings altogether give support to foreign technology diffusion as a major conduit for growth prospects in Vietnamese manufactures.     

An empirical note on international R&D spillovers

Whether international R&D spillovers are global and trade-related is still a debated issue. By adopting two specifications that nest models previously estimated in the literature, we test the hypothesis that international R&D spillovers are global and trade-unrelated for a sample of OECD countries over the period 1971–2004. In particular, via a randomization exercise, we reject the null hypothesis of a “global pool of technology” and show that there are partitions of countries associated with relatively strong/weak knowledge spillovers. Then, we estimate a nonlinear specification that includes simultaneously geographical distance and international trade among the determinants of domestic TFP. We find robust evidence that both factors affect how foreign knowledge impacts on the domestic productivity of each recipient country.     

Determinants of International R&D Outsourcing: The Role of Trade

This paper investigates the determinants of international R&D outsourcing, in particular the role of trade. We sketch a monopolistic competition model with heterogeneous firms where outsourcing increases a firm's fixed transaction costs as well as its productivity. Financial constraints affect the decision to outsource R&D more to nonexporters than to exporters. In contrast, exporters are more sensitive to a lack of information because they have higher losses when there is technology leakage. We test these predictions using a panel database of Spanish companies. The results highlight the relevance of information in competitive markets, and the role of trade to induce companies to engage in other globalization strategies.     

On `indirect' trade-related R&D spillovers

An influential literature argues that trade promotes knowledge flows and technology transmission between trading partners. This literature focuses on `direct' research and development (R&D) spillovers which are related to the levels of R&D produced by the trading partners. In this paper, we argue that `indirect' trade-related R&D spillovers also take place between countries, even if they do not trade with each other. These `indirect' spillovers are associated with available rather than with produced levels of R&D. Our empirical results suggest that these `indirect' trade-related spillovers are at least as important as the `direct' ones, and strengthen the view that trade does matter for the international transmission of R&D. They also suggest that, due to the existence of these `indirect' effects, bilateral trade patterns are relatively less important determinants of the level of foreign R&D spillovers acquired through trade.     

Endogenous Growth and Trade Liberalization Between Small and Large Countries

The paper combines insight from new trade theory and R&D-based endogenous growth models to argue that there are ambiguous growth effects of trade liberalization between countries that differ in terms of the size of their home markets. In particular, trade liberalization may reduce R&D incentives in countries with low purchasing power without invoking parallel increases in countries with high purchasing power. The paper also considers the case of imperfect international knowledge spillovers, and demonstrates that complete trade liberalization may affect the growth rate negatively.     

我国外贸技术溢出效应的国别差异分析

技术溢出是发展中国家追赶发达国家的重要路径,溢出的渠道包括国际贸易、FDI、R＆D合作、国外R＆D投资等。我们运用经拓展后的Coe＆Helpman的贸易溢出计量模型,试图将我国从商品贸易以及FDI中所获得的技术溢出纳入同一模型中加以综合分析,并对贸易带来的技术溢出效应进行国别差异分析,以判断不同类型国家对我国吸收技术溢出效应的影响。并在此基础上,提出了相应的政策建议。     

Technology transfer through imports

Abstract .  We study international technology transfer through R&D spillovers in sixteen countries' manufacturing industries since the early 1970s. The analysis shows that the productivity impact of international technology transfer often exceeds that of domestic technological change, more so in high-technology industries. Moreover, technology transfer is found to be strongly varying across country-pairs and tends to decline in geographic distance, pointing to goods trade as the transfer channel. We directly evaluate this hypothesis, and results suggest that trade is crucial for technology transfer from Germany, France, and the UK, while for the US, Japan, and Canada non-trade channels are more important.     

Trade Liberalization and Productivity Growth

This paper presents a trade model with firm‐level productivity differences and R&D‐driven growth. Trade liberalization causes the least productive firms to exit but also slows the development of new products. The overall effect on productivity growth depends on the size of intertemporal knowledge spillovers in R&D. When these spillovers are relatively weak, then trade liberalization promotes productivity growth in the short run and makes consumers better off in the long run. However, when these spillovers are relatively strong, then trade liberalization retards productivity growth in the short run and makes consumers worse off in the long run.