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A dissertation submitted to the Department of History in fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts in the Faculty Arts at the University of Zululand, 2018. / Bilateral trade flows among the BRICS member states thus far have contributed mutually between the progressions of each country and continue to. Nevertheless, South Africa‘s economy does not allow it to continue lagging behind its alliance partners. South Africa needed to be robust when it comes to the trade agreements with the group, since South Africa‘s economy has been scrabbling in growth in the past few years. With South Africa‘s economy still experiencing pressure from the global economic slowdown and domestic structural bottlenecks including labour unrest, unemployment remains high especially among young Africans and income inequality has increased. Economic growth has been volatile as the country has had to cope with the consequences of global crises. With all of these challenges the country is facing, one can only ask about where the aid of the BRIC countries is. Conversely, South Africa‘s role as the member of BRICS still remains cognisance. The bilateral flows of BRICS countries still remain largely influenced by the gains of China, however with time, the export and import performance continue increasing the volume of trade of each BRICS country, which also alone increases each country‘s economic activities like the FDI and the in-flow and out-flows of imports and exports industry.1 The BRICS countries today present an opportunity as new growth poles in a multi-polar world. As demonstrated during the global crisis when they played a pivotal role by recovering fast from the crisis; more than just that, the BRICS countries as a unit carry the capacity of changing the world on account of both the threats and the opportunities they present economically, socially and politically.2 Analysts and international agencies suggest and advice that investors should pay careful attention to the opportunities offered by BRICS member states and the impact and influence they carry globally.

This study explores the impact of economic downturn in the EU-27 on Syrian trade and the sensitivity of oil and petroleum products to this downturn. This is carried out using a derivation of the gravity model to determine the export demand. Syrian export with its top 30 trading partners as well as the EU-27 are taken into consideration along with various other trade determinants when measuring the changes in total export volume. The study finds that EU-27 is an important source of demand for Syria, but a downturn in the EU economy will not necessarily have a detrimental effect on Syrian economy. On the other hand, oil plays a far more important role on the country’s exports and its demand is less sensitive to economic fluctuations.

Agricultural support levels are at a crossroad with reduced distortions in OECD countries and increasing support for agricultural producers in emerging economies over the last decades. This paper studies the determinants of distortions in the agricultural markets by putting a specific focus on the role of trade policy. Applying various different dynamic panel data estimators and explicitly accounting for potential endogeneity of trade policy agreements, we find that an increase in the number of bilateral free trade agreements exhibits significant short- and long-run distortion reducing effects. By contrast, WTO's Uruguay Agreement on Agriculture has not been able to systematically contribute to a reduction in agriculture trade distortions. From a policy point of view our findings thus point to a lack of effectiveness of multilateral trade negotiations. / Series: Department of Economics Working Paper Series

A partir da década de 1990, houve uma proliferação de Acordos Preferenciais de Comércio (APC) ao redor do mundo. Dentro deste cenário de mudança do comércio mundial, a América Latina foi um importante ator na criação de novos acordos. Entretanto, devido a histórica instabilidade política e econômica da região, nunca houve uma integração de fato, devido principalmente ao caráter protecionista dos países. Nesse sentido, a Aliança do Pacífico (Chile, Colômbia, Peru e México) vem com uma proposta de integração econômica diferente, com objetivo de unir suas economias ainda mais e estar aberta às negociações comerciais com terceiros países. O objetivo deste estudo é estimar o comércio bilateral potencial entre os países membros da Aliança do Pacífico (AP), através do modelo gravitacional de comércio por meio de dados em painel com efeitos fixos para o ano de 2013, com uma amostra de 98 países. Os resultados mostraram que o comércio estimado para o ano de 2013 ficou apenas 1% abaixo do comércio efetivo, o equivalente a US$ 240,6 milhões. A análise por par de países mostrou que o mais beneficiado com a criação da AP seria o México, expandindo consideravelmente suas importações e exportações. / From the 1990s, there was a proliferation of Preferential Trade Agreements (APC) around the world. Within this world trade change of scenery, Latin America was a key player in the creation of new agreements. However, due to historical political and economic instability in the region, there has never been an integration, mainly due to the protectionist nature of countries. In this sense, the Pacific Alliance (Chile, Colombia, Peru and Mexico) comes with a proposal for a different economic integration, aiming to unite their economies further and be open to trade negotiations with third countries. The aim of this study is to estimate the bilateral trade potential between the member countries of the Pacific Alliance (PA), through the gravitational trade model in panel data with fixed effects for year 2013, with a sample of 98 countries. The results showed that the estimated trade for the year 2013 was only 1% below the actual trade, equivalent to US $ 240.6 million. Analysis by pair of countries showed that most benefited from the creation of the Pacific Alliance would be Mexico, considerably expanding its imports and exports.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the changes in trade values are affected by the implementation of the euro currency. We study the EU members, including 11 EMU members and 3 non-EMU members (Sweden, Denmark and the United Kingdom). The empirical analysis is conducted by using a modified version of the standard gravity model. Our core findings can be summarized into two parts. First, the euro effect on trade which is estimated by the euro-dummy coefficient reflects an adverse influence by the euro creation on trade values for the first two years of the implementation on all our sample countries. It leads us to a conclusion that there is no significant improvement of trade in the year of implementation. These results do not change when a time trend variable is added to evaluate the robustness of the model. Our primary interpretation is that the euro creation does not have an immediate impact on trade but it is rather gradual as countries need time to adapt to a new currency. It is connected to our second finding that the negative influence of the euro implementation is not permanent but eventually initiates positive outcomes on trade values over time, thus concluding that the euro implementation has had gradual impact on both EMU and non-EMU members.

This study analyzes the J-curve effect for Turkey&rsquo / s bilateral trade with her three main trading partners / Germany, USA and Italy, for consumption, capital and intermediate goods. The bounds test is used to test for cointegration among the trade balance, the real bilateral exchange rate, the real domestic income and the real foreign income. The results show that the real exchange rate is not a significant determinant of trade in the short run. In the long run, it is significant only for trade with USA in consumption goods. Moreover, J-curve does not exist for Turkey&rsquo / s bilateral trade with Germany, USA, and Italy in consumption, capital and intermediate goods. The results support existence of a link between the bilateral trade balances and the real domestic income both in the short run and the long run.

This study investigates the influence of bilateral free-trade agreements (FTAs) on the international expansion of developing-country multinational enterprises (MNEs). The study includes ten case studies of Thai MNEs in the food industry. The study explores the responses of these firms to three of Thailand’s bilateral FTAs (Thailand–Australia FTA, Thailand–New Zealand Closer Economic Partnership and Thailand–Japan Economic Partnership Agreement). All the case firms regard these Agreements favourably. The findings offer insight into the role of bilateral FTAs in Thai MNEs’ internationalisation. The Agreements help firms to internationalise, at the same time influencing the corporate adjustments they have to make. The firms in this study share a number of common responses, which include adjustments in product strategy and the development of new business networks. The findings also suggest differences among firms in their internal adjustments in response to FTAs. First, some firms respond much more vigorously than others. Second, in order to reap the full benefit of the FTAs and internationalise successfully, some have to develop new strengths; for example, the ability to coordinate and integrate activities more closely. The analysis of the research findings of this study suggests some modification of the inherited theoretical framework, by means of which the impact and role of government trade policy in the internationalisation of firms is assessed. The overall impact of bilateral FTAs on Thai MNEs in the food sector is positive but modest. Directly, FTAs influence the development of firms’ internal strategies, capabilities and resources. Further studies are recommended to test if FTAs impact on other types of firms, other sectors of business, and other countries in the same ways. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1383228 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, Business School, 2010

A partir da década de 1990, houve uma proliferação de Acordos Preferenciais de Comércio (APC) ao redor do mundo. Dentro deste cenário de mudança do comércio mundial, a América Latina foi um importante ator na criação de novos acordos. Entretanto, devido a histórica instabilidade política e econômica da região, nunca houve uma integração de fato, devido principalmente ao caráter protecionista dos países. Nesse sentido, a Aliança do Pacífico (Chile, Colômbia, Peru e México) vem com uma proposta de integração econômica diferente, com objetivo de unir suas economias ainda mais e estar aberta às negociações comerciais com terceiros países. O objetivo deste estudo é estimar o comércio bilateral potencial entre os países membros da Aliança do Pacífico (AP), através do modelo gravitacional de comércio por meio de dados em painel com efeitos fixos para o ano de 2013, com uma amostra de 98 países. Os resultados mostraram que o comércio estimado para o ano de 2013 ficou apenas 1% abaixo do comércio efetivo, o equivalente a US$ 240,6 milhões. A análise por par de países mostrou que o mais beneficiado com a criação da AP seria o México, expandindo consideravelmente suas importações e exportações. / From the 1990s, there was a proliferation of Preferential Trade Agreements (APC) around the world. Within this world trade change of scenery, Latin America was a key player in the creation of new agreements. However, due to historical political and economic instability in the region, there has never been an integration, mainly due to the protectionist nature of countries. In this sense, the Pacific Alliance (Chile, Colombia, Peru and Mexico) comes with a proposal for a different economic integration, aiming to unite their economies further and be open to trade negotiations with third countries. The aim of this study is to estimate the bilateral trade potential between the member countries of the Pacific Alliance (PA), through the gravitational trade model in panel data with fixed effects for year 2013, with a sample of 98 countries. The results showed that the estimated trade for the year 2013 was only 1% below the actual trade, equivalent to US $ 240.6 million. Analysis by pair of countries showed that most benefited from the creation of the Pacific Alliance would be Mexico, considerably expanding its imports and exports.

A partir da década de 1990, houve uma proliferação de Acordos Preferenciais de Comércio (APC) ao redor do mundo. Dentro deste cenário de mudança do comércio mundial, a América Latina foi um importante ator na criação de novos acordos. Entretanto, devido a histórica instabilidade política e econômica da região, nunca houve uma integração de fato, devido principalmente ao caráter protecionista dos países. Nesse sentido, a Aliança do Pacífico (Chile, Colômbia, Peru e México) vem com uma proposta de integração econômica diferente, com objetivo de unir suas economias ainda mais e estar aberta às negociações comerciais com terceiros países. O objetivo deste estudo é estimar o comércio bilateral potencial entre os países membros da Aliança do Pacífico (AP), através do modelo gravitacional de comércio por meio de dados em painel com efeitos fixos para o ano de 2013, com uma amostra de 98 países. Os resultados mostraram que o comércio estimado para o ano de 2013 ficou apenas 1% abaixo do comércio efetivo, o equivalente a US$ 240,6 milhões. A análise por par de países mostrou que o mais beneficiado com a criação da AP seria o México, expandindo consideravelmente suas importações e exportações. / From the 1990s, there was a proliferation of Preferential Trade Agreements (APC) around the world. Within this world trade change of scenery, Latin America was a key player in the creation of new agreements. However, due to historical political and economic instability in the region, there has never been an integration, mainly due to the protectionist nature of countries. In this sense, the Pacific Alliance (Chile, Colombia, Peru and Mexico) comes with a proposal for a different economic integration, aiming to unite their economies further and be open to trade negotiations with third countries. The aim of this study is to estimate the bilateral trade potential between the member countries of the Pacific Alliance (PA), through the gravitational trade model in panel data with fixed effects for year 2013, with a sample of 98 countries. The results showed that the estimated trade for the year 2013 was only 1% below the actual trade, equivalent to US $ 240.6 million. Analysis by pair of countries showed that most benefited from the creation of the Pacific Alliance would be Mexico, considerably expanding its imports and exports.