Foreign direct investment and productivity spillovers in the Chinese manufacturing sector

In this paper a simple simultaneous model is constructed to examine whether there are productivity spillovers from both the presence of foreign direct investment (FDI) and competition between local and foreign firms. The model is tested on the data from China’s latest industrial census in 1995. The results indicate that the extent to which spillovers occur varies with different types of ownership of local firms and of FDI. While collective- and private-owned enterprises benefit from demonstration and contagion effects from foreign presence, productivity gains of state-owned enterprises largely come from competition with foreign firms. Productivities of local and foreign firms are jointly determined. Evidence also suggests that market-oriented FDI tends to generate spillovers mainly via competition with local firms.     

WHY IS THERE A LACK OF EVIDENCE ON KNOWLEDGE SPILLOVERS FROM FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT?

Empirical analyses of knowledge spillovers from foreign direct investment (FDI) offer mixed results; they find positive, neutral and negative FDI spillover effects. This lack of evidence mainly comes from the results of firm‐level panel data analysis. This is important since this approach seems to be the most appropriate for estimating FDI spillovers. The paper takes a look at recent substantive and methodological developments in FDI spillover analysis, which have brought some more optimistic results with regard to FDI spillovers, and can help in further development in this field. The main substantive development relates to the introduction of a broad variety of sources of firm heterogeneity (foreign affiliates as well as local firms) in the analysis. Others include differentiation between vertical (inter‐industry) and horizontal (intra‐industry) spillovers, and host country absorptive capacity for knowledge spillovers. Methodological developments relate to distinguishing between technological/knowledge and productivity spillovers, improvement of modelling and estimation methods, and an increased amount and quality of data.     

FDI spillovers and firm productivity during crisis: Empirical evidence from transition economies

Most studies on foreign direct investment (FDI) are nested within periods of economic prosperity. Our study investigates the impact of FDI spillovers on productivity during the global financial crisis (2006–2014) and the accompanying credit shortage. A dynamic panel analysis of firm-level data from two neighbouring but distinct transition economies, Croatia and Slovenia, reveals that the impact of the crisis may go as far as halting the process of learning through spillovers if firms have difficulties in accessing external funds. The implications of the study may prove particularly beneficial to policy makers grappling with the economic crisis following the COVID-19 pandemic.     

Foreign Direct Investment and Managerial Knowledge Spillovers through the Diffusion of Management Practices

Although managerial knowledge spillovers have long been claimed to be a major benefit of foreign direct investment (FDI), such spillovers have not yet been systematically analysed. This paper adds to the literature by analysing the nature and extent of managerial knowledge spillovers from FDI through the diffusion of management practices. Taking into account the tacit and explicit elements of management practices and distinguishing between industry and non‐industry specific practices, the paper identifies different types of spillovers and discusses their transmission mechanisms. Evidence from establishment‐level panel data from the UK attests to the existence and significance of intra‐industry, linkage, and non‐linkage based inter‐industry spillovers of managerial knowledge from foreign to local firms, although the strength varies for different types of practices. The spillovers are geographically localized, especially in channels without supply chain linkages. Local firms are selective in the adoption of individual practices and the spillover effects are more significant at the cluster and management system level. Reverse spillovers from local firms to MNEs from industrialized countries appear to be limited despite significant spillovers of practices amongst local firms.     

A META-ANALYSIS OF FDI AND PRODUCTIVITY SPILLOVERS IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES

This meta-analysis reviews the intrasector heterogeneity of productivity spillovers from foreign direct investment (FDI) in 31 developing countries through a larger more comprehensive data set. We investigate how the inconsistencies in the reported spillover findings are affected by publication bias, characteristics of the data, estimation techniques, and empirical specification, analyzing 1450 spillover estimates from 69 empirical studies published in 1986–2013. Our findings suggest that reported FDI spillover estimates are affected by publication bias. In combination with model misspecification of the primary studies, the bias overstates the genuine underlying meta-effect, but the meta-effect remains economically and statistically significant. Our results emphasize that spillovers and their sign largely depend systematically on specification characteristics of the primary studies and publication bias. Publication bias is not caused by “best practice” choices. Future research needs to cover more developing countries and to investigate not only whether spillovers occur, but also to explore inside the black box of how spillovers actually emerge.     

Absorptive Capacity and Productivity Spillovers from FDI: A Threshold Regression Analysis*

This paper explores whether the effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on productivity growth is dependent on absorptive capacity using recently developed threshold regression techniques. In manufacturing sectors where technology‐exploiting multinationals are prevalent, the results point to the presence of nonlinear threshold effects: the productivity benefit from FDI increases with absorptive capacity until some threshold level beyond which it becomes less pronounced. But there is also a minimum absorptive capacity threshold level below which productivity spillovers from FDI are negligible or even negative. On the contrary, no evidence of productivity spillovers is found in sectors where FDI appears to be motivated by technology‐sourcing considerations.     

Identifying the impact of geographical proximity on spillover effect of FDI: The evidence from Indian local firms’ performance gains

This paper investigates the role of geographical proximity on FDI spillovers from foreign to Indian local firms. We use data set of the manufacturing firms between 1988 and 2018 in India, estimating the productivity based on Cobb–Douglas production function. For measuring geographical proximity, the coordinates of each firm, represented to as ‘latitude and longitude’, provided by Google maps geocoding API is used. To conduct spatial analysis, we adopted the revised ‘SINM’ (Spatial Industrial Network Model)’ with GMM estimator, and used firm based point spatial unit. The analysis, in particular, reveals that within 30 km–70 km distance the presence of FDI creates significant positive backward and negative horizontal spillovers, but gradually decaying as threshold increases. Meanwhile, the negative horizontal spillovers to Indian local firms located within industrial clusters turned to positive, and the positive backward spillovers more magnifies compared to non-clustered firms. Based on these findings, we suggested the several policy implications regarding the development of industrial cluster, FDI promotion policy, and location decision for foreign investors.     

Do Ukrainian Firms Benefit from FDI?

All countries are eager to attract as much foreign direct investments (FDI) as possible. At the same time FDI may have not only positive, but also negative economic effects for receiving countries. Positive effects are associated with technology transfer, efficient allocation of resources, and training of domestic workers. However, the entry of foreign firms could, e.g., lead to a decrease of labor productivity at domestic firms, which is a negative effect. The main purpose of this paper is to estimate direct and indirect effects of FDI. First, we test for direct influence of foreign direct investments on firms performance, where the latter is estimated alternatively as labor productivity and as exports. FDI notably increases both labor productivity and export volumes. Second, we look for spillover or indirect effects. There is statistical evidence that the levels of FDI in certain regional industries are associated with higher performance indicators of firms not receiving FDI in those same regional industries.JEL Classification: L1, L6, F2     

Foreign Direct Investment Strategies and Firms' Capabilities

This paper presents a simple model to analyze the effect of geographically localized spillovers on the internationalization decision of firms. It is shown that, once spatially bounded externalities are taken into account, the standard predictions on the nature and direction of foreign direct investment (FDI) flows may be reversed. We highlight three effects. First, an FDI-en-hancing effect: the presence of spillovers increases the profitability of the FDI strategy when the competitive gap between firms is narrow. Second, a dissipation effect: firms may refrain from investing abroad for fear of diffusion of their firm-specific assets. Third, a sourcing effect: the presence of spillovers may induce a firm to invest abroad, even in the absence of exporting costs.     

In search of FDI horizontal spillovers in China: evidence from meta-analysis

Quality & Quantity - This paper contributes to the literature on foreign direct investment (FDI) technology spillover effects, focusing on horizontal spillovers from foreign firms to their...     

外商直接投资在中国的空间外溢效应研究

本文的研究结果发现,除了国外直接投资对大型企业不存在空间外溢比邻优势外,国外直接投资对中、小型企业以及港澳台地区直接投资对所有规模的企业均存在一定的空间外溢比邻优势;外商直接投资拉大了东西部企业生产率的差距,其中港澳台地区直接投资对东西部大型企业的生产率外溢差异远大于国外直接投资,港澳台地区直接投资分布相对集中于东部以及其对大型企业表现出的比邻优势使其外溢效应出现明显的区域差异,这是导致东西部生产率差异的主要因素;外商直接投资对不同规模的企业具有不同的外溢效应,加剧了我国大、小企业之间的竞争地位差异。     

Firm Productivity and the Foreign‐Market Entry Decision

We use Japanese firm‐level data to examine how a firm’s productivity affects its foreign‐market entry strategy. The firm faces a choice between exporting and foreign direct investment (FDI). In the case of FDI, the firm has two options: greenfield investment or acquisition of an existing plant (M&A). If it selects greenfield investment, it has two ownership choices: whole ownership or a joint venture with a local company. Controlling for industry‐ and country‐specific characteristics, we find that the more productive a firm is, the more likely it is to choose FDI rather than exporting and greenfield investment rather than M&A.     

How Important is Foreign Direct Investment?

The degree of multinationality of an economy's production is determined by the extent of production in other economies by domestically-owned firms, and by production located in the economy in question by foreign-owned firms. In the absence of direct measures, international production (that is, production under foreign ownership) is normally measured at a national level by outward and inward foreign direct investment (FDI) stocks. Unfortunately, the existing practice of reporting FDI stocks on a historical cost basis (i.e. book values) is unsatisfactory, because it does not take into account the age distribution of stocks, thus making accurate international comparisons of FDI stocks almost impossible (see e.g. Cantwell, 1984, 1992; Bellak and Cantwell, 1996). We have re-estimated the FDI stocks of Japan, Germany, the US and the UK at replacement values using a perpetual inventory model (PIM). The results cast doubt on some of the conventional wisdoms about international production, derived from historic cost data.     

国内投入、中间进口与FDI垂直溢出——基于非竞争型投入产出表的实证研究

本文通过将FDI垂直溢出进行分解,并考虑投入产出效率的动态变化,检验了中国FDI溢出效应。结果表明:不存在线性水平溢出,但不排除非线性的可能性;不存在倒U形的技术溢出特征,外企通过购买国内投入而产生的后向溢出是最重要的技术溢出渠道,且对产出的影响成非线性,而外企通过购买中间进口而产生的后向溢出则可能存在门槛效应;外企通过提供中间进口而产生的前向溢出是否存在并不确定,由线性溢出回归可知外企通过提供国内投入而产生的前向溢出为负。     

PARTIAL PRIVATIZATION, TECHNOLOGY SPILLOVERS, AND FOREIGN OWNERSHIP RESTRICTION

Using a mixed oligopoly model with foreign ownership, this paper examines the interaction between two market-opening policies: the relaxation of foreign ownership restriction and the privatization of domestic public firms. It particularly focuses on technology spillovers, which could be one of the most prominent motivations for introducing foreign investment into a domestic market. The first result demonstrates that the optimal level of privatization is affected by technology spillovers from foreign investment and is negatively related with the magnitude of technology spillovers. The second result shows that the optimal level of privatization is lower when foreign ownership restriction is abolished than that when foreign ownership is not fully allowed. The third result indicates that the government relaxes regulations on foreign ownership of domestic firms only if the magnitude of technology spillovers is significant.     

How Domestic and Foreign Firms Differ and Why Does it Matter?

Abstract.  This paper reviews and summarises the results of selected studies on performance gaps between multinational enterprises and their domestic counterparts. Performance gaps arise in such fields as productivity, technology, profitability, wages, skills and growth. While these gaps are often attributed to foreign ownership of the affiliates, the theory of the Multinational Enterprise argues that these gaps are due to being a Multinational rather than the nationality of the firm. Empirical evidence on the existence of performance gaps between foreign and domestic firms is supportive of this view: foreign ownership turns out to be a much less important explanatory factor than normally assumed. Firm‐specific assets and firm characteristics like industry, size, parent country and multinationality per se are more important. Such results are broadly consistent with those derived in the literatures on ownership change, on foreign entry and on spillovers. We conclude that there is little case for foreign direct investment promotion policies to discriminate between firms on the basis of ownership.     

Learning and technological capability building in emerging economies: The case of the biomass power equipment industry in Malaysia

There is increasing recognition that the transfer of foreign technology to developing countries should be considered in light of broader processes of learning, technological capability, formation and industrial development. Previous studies that have looked at this in the context of cleantech industries in emerging economies tend to overlook firm-level specifics. This paper contributes to filling this gap by utilising in-depth qualitative firm-level data to analyse the extent to which the use of different learning mechanisms can explain differences in the accumulation of technological capabilities. This is explored via an examination of eight firms in the biomass power equipment industry in Malaysia during the period 1970–2011. The paper finds that firms relying on a combination of learning from foreign technology partners and internal learning by planned experimentation make most progress in terms of technological capability. Nevertheless, local spill-over effects were found to be important for some firms who learned principally from imitation of local competitors, although significantly, firms learning from local spillovers failed to advance beyond extra basic operating technological capabilities. Those firms who proactively pursued learning from foreign partners, on the other hand, advanced further, reaching basic innovative levels of technological capabilities. These findings are relevant for a wider range of industrial sectors in emerging economies.     

Brexit and FDI

• The potential for a departure from the EU to undermine the UK's attractiveness as a location for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is often cited as one of the key risks were the UK to leave the EU. In weighing up the threat to FDI posed by ‘Brexit’ we assess the net gain from inward investment and the role played by EU membership in attracting FDI.
• In theory, FDI benefits the economy via lower interest rates, higher wages for workers and ‘spillover’ benefits boosting economy‐wide productivity. But the evidence for these benefits is ambiguous. And FDI has potential drawbacks. These include an adverse effect on the tradeable sector, reflected in a wider current account deficit, the potential to ‘crowd out’ investment by domestic firms and the fiscal cost of subsidies paid to inward investors.
• That almost half of FDI in the UK comes from other EU countries suggests that EU membership is not the only driver of foreign investment in the UK. Other factors include the UK's business friendly environment, as reflected in global competitiveness surveys, and a relatively deregulated labour market. Of perhaps most importance is the lure provided by the UK's large domestic economy. 80% of FDI in the UK is in sectors where sales to the EU account for less than 10% of total demand.
• However, FDI in manufacturing does look vulnerable to Brexit, given the importance of the EU market. Granted, manufacturing accounts for a modest share of UK FDI. But to the extent that FDI boosts productivity, a loss of inward investment in this sector is likely to come at a disproportionate cost.
• Our modelling suggests that in a worst case Brexit scenario, the stock of FDI could ultimately be 7% lower relative to the UK remaining in the EU, potentially knocking around ½% off the level of GDP.

     

Multinational Corporations and Spillovers

This paper examines spillover effects of the activities of multinational firms. Such effects are most likely to be found in host countries, where the operations of foreign multinationals may influence local firms in the MNCs own industry as well as firms in other industries. However, there is no comprehensive evidence on the exact nature or magnitude of these effects, although it is suggested that host country spillovers vary systematically between countries and industries. In particular, the positive effects of foreign investment are likely to increase with the level of local capability and competition. The spillovers to the home countries of MNCs are often more difficult to identify, for various reasons. Earlier studies suggest that the effects are generally positive, but the increasing international division of labor within multinationals complicates the analysis. The impact on the home country is likely to depend on what activities these firms concentrate at home.