卫生和植物检疫措施影响农产品贸易的理论模型--以猪肉为例

本文从卫生和植物检疫(SPS)措施导致的遵从成本出发,建立了经济学局部均衡分析模型,研究SPS措施对中国猪肉贸易的影响效应。分析表明:SPS措施对猪肉贸易的影响在宏观上表现为贸易禁止、贸易限制和贸易扭曲。微观上的影响在短期和长期是不同的。文章还分析了在一对一歧视、多对一歧视和非歧视情况下遵从成本的大小。研究发现,当所有进口国对所有出口国无歧视的采用同一SPS措施的情况下,遵从成本被各国分摊,对于单个出口国来说,这时遵从成本最低。因此,对于贸易商来说,最重要的是追求贸易中的公平待遇。     

试论世贸组织《卫生和植物检疫协议》面临的新挑战

世贸组织《卫生和植物检疫》(SPS)协议对于规范国际贸易中SPS措施的使用起了非常积极的作用。然而,目前该协议却受到某些新问题的挑战,其中包括:转基因农产品的安全性争端,世贸组织无歧视原则的适应性,发展中国家遵从SPS的困难和遵从成本,发展中国家参与国际组织的困境以及SPS模糊条款的具体化和清晰化。这些问题的正确解决将进一步提高SPS协议的执行效率和各国SPS措施的规范化。     

SPS对我国禽肉出口影响的经济学分析

SPS(Sanitary and Phyto-sanitary Agreement)(卫生与动植物检疫)措施是与风险密切相关的技术性贸易措施,SPS协议是用来规范成员国SPS措施的世贸组织协议,是成员国必须遵守的章程。目前SPS措施壁垒已成为中国禽肉出口的主要障碍。本文运用经济学局部均衡分析框架分析了SPS措施对我国禽肉出口的影响效应。研究认为,SPS措施对禽肉出口的短期影响为数量限制,而长期影响则表现为贸易限制(禁止)和贸易转移效应,最后用实证案例对SPS措施产生的贸易效应进行了验证。针对SPS措施的影响,认为加强我国防疫体系建设,建设无规定疫病区,严格控制药物使用和残留监控,采用HACCP认证等提高我国SPS水平,以较高的遵从成本换取更高的遵从收益。     

SPS壁垒的评判标准探讨

文章解析了SPS兴起的经济学基础,梳理了SPS措施与技术性贸易措施及绿色贸易措施的关系,进而根据WTO相关规则原创性地提出了评判正当SPS措施的8条标准,并且分析了这些标准背后隐藏的问题。文章提出,我国针对SPS措施和SPS壁垒应采取不同的应对策略:积极"遵从"国际贸易中正当的SPS措施;向WTO争端解决机制"申诉",运用法律和谈判手段解决SPS壁垒;对于我国和其他发展中国家面临的客观"SPS壁垒",国际组织应尽快澄清SPS协议中的模糊规定,提高SPS协议的执行度;同时,国际组织和发达国家要积极援助发展中国家,提高他们的遵从能力,发展中国家也要积极主动参与国际标准的制定,从游戏规则的被动接受者转变为制定者。     

Effects of the Regional Trading Arrangements on Trade: Evidence from the NAFTA,ANZCER and ASEAN Countries, 1989 – 2000

Using the modified gravity model, this study examines whether the free trade areas of NAFTA, ANZCER and ASEAN would result in trade creation among the member countries and trade diversion with the non-member countries. Further, it applies Linder's income similarity concept to explain the trade patterns in the developed and developing countries within these free trade areas. First, the results suggest that the implementations of the free trade areas have facilitated higher trade among the member countries, particularly the ANZCER and ASEAN countries. However, among all three free trade areas, the formation of the ANZCER free trade area has resulted in trade diversion with non-member countries, whereas that of the ASEAN free trade area has resulted in a trade increase with non-member countries. Surprisingly, the formation of the NAFTA free trade area has no significant effect on trade with non-member countries as their trade flows remain quite low even before its implementation. Second, the result indicates that the trade-enhancing effect of income similarity is confirmed for the developing rather than developed member countries. The developing member countries with similar incomes would trade extensively more with each other. This result can be partly explained by Hanink's income threshold concept, which argues that the income similarity effect is only applicable to developed countries with very small difference in incomes. Given the heterogeneous country sample in this study, the substantial income differences among the developed member countries would probably account for the lack of income similarity effect in these countries.     

Food Safety Issues,Trade and WTO Rules: A Developing Country Perspective

The SPS Agreement and the related WTO dispute settlement mechanism are an important first step in strengthening the global trade architecture, bringing in greater transparency and orderly conditions to world food trade. However, implementation of the new trade rules has turned out to be a more complex task than the traditional market access issues handled by the WTO. Several factors, including inadequate financial and technical resources, have constrained devel‐oping countries from becoming effective participants in the implementation process, and there is widespread suspicion that SPS regulations are being used as hidden protectionist devices by developed countries. However, despite all the problems, some developing countries have been quite successful in penetrating developed country food markets; they have done so by accepting the consumer preferences and standards in quality‐sensitive high‐income markets and implementing domestic supply‐side measures. While making full use of available international assistance initiatives, developing countries should view the task of complying with SPS standards not just as a barrier but also as an opportunity to upgrade quality standards and market sophistication in the food export sector.     

Factors underlying sanitary and phytosanitary regulation for food and agricultural imports notified by WTO members

The impact of sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures has been extensively studied in the trade literature. However, there is very scant research on the factors underlying the World Trade Organization (WTO) members’ regulatory process. The aim of this paper is to fill that gap, examining the main determinants for the development of SPS regulation considering the notifications presented by WTO members. A negative binomial regression was estimated, where the dependent variable was the number of SPS measures notified during the period 1995–2012 by WTO members, while the explanatory variables were related to each country: (1) agricultural production value; (2) agricultural imports weight; (3) health concerns; (4) agricultural import tariffs; and (5) scientific and legal capacities. The results provide evidence that legal and scientific capacities are major factors in the number of notifications presented by WTO members. On the other hand, those countries with a higher relative weight of the agricultural sector in the economy or of agricultural products in their imports have notified fewer SPS measures. This leads to the conclusion that it is necessary to reinforce actions that strengthen institutional and technical capacities for further convergence.     

Optimal Rules of Origin with Asymmetric Compliance Costs under International Duopoly

We examine the optimal rules of origin (ROO) in a free trade area/agreement (FTA) by employing a stylized three-country partial equilibrium model of an international duopoly. We incorporate compliance costs of the ROO into the model. In particular, compliance costs are higher for a firm located in a non-member country of the FTA than for a firm (an internal firm) located in an FTA member country, whereas marginal production costs are lower for the former. The FTA member countries set the optimal level of ROO to maximize their joint welfare. An importing country within the FTA imposes tariffs on imports that do not comply with the ROO. We show that the optimal ROO may have a protectionist bias in the sense that they are set for only the internal firm to comply. ROO may also cause low utilization of FTAs when they are set such that even the internal firm does not comply with them. These cases arise depending on parameter values.     

Impact of Openness on Growth in Different Country Groups

This paper evaluates the impact of openness on growth in different country groups using a panel of 79 countries over the period 1970–98. It distinguishes itself from many existing studies in three aspects: Firstly, both trade and FDI are included as measures of openness. Secondly, countries are classified into high‐, middle‐ and low‐income groups to compare the roles of trade and FDI in these groups. Thirdly, the possible problems of endogeneity and multicollinearity of trade and FDI are carefully dealt with in a panel data setting. The main findings are as follows. Total trade has a general positive impact on growth in all country groups, although the impact from imports is not significant in high‐income countries. FDI has a positive impact on growth in high‐ and middle‐income countries, but not in low‐income countries. With the existing absorptive capabilities, low‐income countries can benefit from both exports and imports, but not from FDI. These findings suggest that trade and FDI affect growth through different channels and under different conditions. The paper also discusses important policy implications.     

Non‐Tariff Measures,Specific Trade Concerns and Tariff Reduction

This paper studies the determinants of the recent proliferation of Specific Trade Concerns raised at the WTO on non‐tariff trade measures (NTMs), with a focus on sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) and technical barriers to trade (TBTs). Even though NTMs are imposed de jure to protect consumers from unhealthy products, they increase trade costs de facto. So, when tariff protection lowers, NTMs become effective barriers to trade and the exporting countries can complain at the dedicated committee at the WTO (STCs). Therefore, we study whether STCs are raised by exporting countries as a consequence of tariff reductions in importing countries, that is when non‐tariff measures become barriers to trade. Using a recent database on STCs over the period 1996–2010, we find empirical evidence that SPS and TBT concerns are raised by exporting country as a consequence of importer's tariff cut.     

ECONOMIC INTEGRATION AMONG THE ASIA-PACIFIC ECONOMIC COOPERATION COUNTRIES: Linder Effect on Developed and Developing Countries (1985–1999)

This study tests the income similarity effect developed by Linder on the developed and developing APEC countries. A modified gravity model is estimated for fourteen APEC countries based on trade data from 1985 to 1999. The result confirms early prediction that the income similarity effect is stronger for developed APEC countries. The developed APEC countries with similar per capita incomes tend to trade more with each other during the study period. In addition, the level of trade between the APEC countries can be predicted by their economic characteristics. The result reveals that trade between the APEC countries would increase as their economies become more developed.     

Market access implications of non‐tariff measures: Estimates for four developed country markets

We quantify the effects of non‐tariff measures on the extensive margin of trade, examining the number of countries exporting particular products to Canada, the European Union, New Zealand and the United States. We find that non‐tariff measures that impose a conformity requirement, that is, testing, certification or inspection, will reduce the number of countries exporting to these markets. Conformity requirements imposed for sanitary or phytosanitary reasons have the largest effect in Canada, reducing the number of exporting countries by 47% compared to the situation where no compliance requirement is imposed. Conformity requirements imposed for other reasons covered by the WTO Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade have the largest effect in Canada and New Zealand, reducing the number of exporting countries by 27% compared to the situation where no compliance requirement is imposed. However, we generally find a statistically significant positive effect for nontariff measures that do not impose a compliance burden, suggesting that such measures may facilitate trade.     

Sanitary and phytosanitary measures in international trade: policy considerations vs. economic reasoning

Sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) measures are one form of non‐tariff international trade barrier with the objective of requiring consumer and intermediate goods to be safe and to provide information to protect consumers from deceptive practices. However, such barriers could severely restrict trade. The central strategy of the World Trade Organization's (WTO) SPS Agreement is to use science to distinguish between those SPS measures consistent with the Agreement and those in violation of the Agreement. SPS measures belong to what is known as trans‐science questions or questions which can be asked of science and yet which cannot be answered by science. Because of the presence of scientific uncertainty, science policies adopted by members should be identified by the WTO. WTO panels should not, however, establish scientific policies. Prohibitive measures would seem rather incompatible with the role the WTO assumed trying to promote free trade. Rather, facilitating the distribution of available information regarding SPS and food safety risk, or a lack of it, to consumers in importing countries would help them to make better informed decisions according to their own preferences and risk aversion.     

An Assessment of Environmentally‐ related Non‐tariff Measures

International trade can affect the environment in different ways. This may justify the introduction of border measures by the importing countries. In addition to various dispositions in the GATT, GATS, TRIPs agreements, as well as in the Agreement on Agriculture, this issue is regulated by the agreements on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) and on the application of Sanitary and Phyto‐sanitary standards (SPS). Despite these rules, abuse of environmental arguments for protectionist reasons remains an open issue. In order to disentangle protectionism from dispositions justified on the grounds of true environmental concerns, we systematically review notifications of SPS and TBTs by importing countries at the tariff line level. Trade is considered as being potentially affected when an environmental SPS/TBT is notified on grounds of environmental concerns. Affected trade is defined as imports by countries notifying such barriers. Protectionist use of environmental barriers is likely when only a limited number of countries impose an environmental obstacle on the imports of a given product. Considering data for 2001, we find that 88 per cent of the value of world trade is in products potentially affected by such measures, while 39 per cent of the value of world imports is potentially subject to a protectionist use of such measures. Agriculture, the automobile industry, the pharmaceutical industry and many other sectors are concerned.     

The Determinants of Regulatory Compliance: An Analysis of Insider Trading Disclosures in Italy

This paper investigates the determinants of regulatory compliance in corporate organizations. Exploiting a unique enforcement and reporting framework for insider trading in Italy, we present three main findings. First, board governance, such as chief executive–chairman duality and the proportion of non-executive directors, does not increase the propensity of firms to comply with regulation. Second, family firms and firms with a high degree of separation of ownership from control are most likely to comply with regulation. Third, corporate ethos is more important in predicting regulatory compliance than explicit corporate governance structures.     

Skill classification does matter: estimating the relationship between trade flows and wage inequality

Empirical work must pay careful attention to how it measures the relative skill abundance of countries and the relative skill intensity embodied in trade flows. This paper compiles a new data set, using income levels, average education, manufacturing wages, and an index of these three variables, to classify countries and trade flows as relatively high skill or low skill. Then, in order to show the importance of skill classification, it uses a reduced-form fixed-effects model to estimate the relationship between trade flows and wage inequality. This specification not only controls for any time-invariant omitted variables, but also permits the inclusion of a large number of diverse countries. When more accurate skill rankings are utilized, results suggest that, in high-skill abundant countries, increased trade with lower-skill countries is correlated with an increase in wage inequality. This relationship is significant and highly robust and is driven by the negative relationship between trade and low-skill wages (instead of a positive relationship between trade and high-skill wages.) Results, however, are highly dependent on the skill classification utilized.     

Technology Trade in Economic Development

Recent evidence on the respective contributions of institutions and trade to income levels across countries has demonstrated that – once endogeneity is considered – institutional quality clearly dominates the effect of trade. We argue that overall trade is not the most appropriate measure for technology diffusion as a source of productivity growth and propose to focus on imports of research and development (R&D)‐intensive goods instead. Overall, we confirm previous findings that institutions matter most and that overall trade is not positively associated with per‐capita income levels. Yet this does not hold for technology trade, as there is a positive and significant linkage between technology imports and income levels. This outcome is robust to various model specifications, including an instrumental variables approach.     

Trade and income convergence: Sorting out the causality

This paper studies the linkage between international trade and income convergence across countries. Different theories offer conflicting predictions regarding how they might affect each other. In the existing empirical literature estimating the trade impact on income convergence, a long-lasting problem is the reverse causality from income convergence to trade. This paper provides a disaggregated bilateral trade data analysis to solve this problem. The results show that the reverse causality from income convergence to trade exists in differentiated product sectors, but not in homogeneous product sectors. Trade in homogeneous sectors reduces the income gaps among trade partners, but it is not significantly affected by their income difference. Therefore, the negative effect of trade in homogeneous sectors on the income gap is free from the reverse causality problem. It can be taken as a pure evidence of trade-induced income convergence. This result is robust to various econometric methods.     

Determinants of Trade: the Role of Innovation in Presence of Quality Standards

This paper analyses the role that quality standards and innovation play on trade volume, by using a gravity model. The role of innovative activity and quality standards in enhancing trade performance is widely accepted in the literature. However, in this paper, we argue that the net effect of quality standards on trade is affected by the exporter’s ability to innovate and comply with these requirements. In particular, by using a sample of 60 exporting countries and 57 importing countries, for a wide range of 26 manufacturing industries over the period 1995–2000, we show that the most innovative industries are more likely to enhance the overall quality of exports, and then gain a competitive advantage. We also find that this effect depends on the level of technology intensity at industry-level and on the level of economic development of exporting country.     

The Effect of Friendly Persuasion and Gender on Tax Comliance Behavior

Friendly persuasion, in contrast to deterrent measures like tax audits and penalties on underreported taxes, is a positive and possibly a cost effective method of increasing taxpayer compliance. However, prior studies have failed to show that friendly persuasion has a significant impact on compliance (Blumenthal et al., 2001; McGraw and Scholz, 1991). In our study, in contrast to prior studies, we examine the impact of generating and reading reasons supporting compliance as friendly persuasion on individuals' income reporting behavior as well as control for gender effects. Specifically, we predict an interaction effect between friendly persuasion and gender on compliance behavior. We carried out a 2 (friendly persuasion and control) × 2 (men and women) full factorial experiment, where participants earned $30 by completing two questionnaires. Participants in the friendly persuasion group were required first to generate and second to read a list of reasons why they should comply fully. Afterwards, participants in both groups were asked to report the income they earned and pay tax on the reported income. The results show a significant main effect for gender as well as a significant interaction effect between gender and friendly persuasion on income reported. Women in the friendly persuasion group reported significantly higher income compared to men in that group. Other comparisons were not significant. Policy implications for increasing taxpayers' ethics and compliance are highlighted.