This paper examines the optimal production and export decisions of an international firm facing exchange rate uncertainty when the firm's preferences exhibit smooth ambiguity aversion. Ambiguity is modeled by a second-order probability distribution that captures the firm's uncertainty about which of the subjective beliefs govern the exchange rate risk. Ambiguity preferences are modeled by the (second-order) expectation of a concave transformation of the (first-order) expected utility of profit conditional on each plausible subjective distribution of the exchange rate risk. Within this framework, we show that ambiguity has no impact on the firm's propensity to export to a foreign country. Ambiguity and ambiguity aversion, however, are shown to have adverse effect on the firm's incentive to export to the foreign country.

The subprime mortgage crisis and the resultant inflationary monetary policy in the USA have left the Chinese economy subject to four risks in particular. First, China's exports to the USA might continue to decline. Second, in the medium term, the higher US inflation rate will lead to a weak dollar, which will negatively affect China's exports. Third, in the long term, when the US Federal Reserve decreases money supply to control inflation, the US economy might enter another recession, hurting China's exports further. Fourth, China's foreign exchange reserve assets might suffer heavy losses when the US inflation rate rises. Conventional foreign exchange investment strategies are insufficient for dealing with these four risks. Investment by China in the major US banks is suggested in the present paper. This strategy would mitigate if not eliminate all four risks. China could gain considerable financial returns on investments with only moderate risk.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to develop and empirically test model depicting the relationships among perceived environmental uncertainty, domestic and foreign networking, and export performance. Design/methodology/approach – A sample of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) from Finland, Sweden and Norway serve as the study setting. Data were collected via mail surveys from random samples of SME owners/managers. Usable responses were 75 from Finland, 111 from Sweden and 71 from Norway. Findings – Of the four dimensions of uncertainty, only uncertainty about supplier markets emerged as a significant driver of domestic networking activities of SMEs. While domestic networking did not have a significant influence, foreign networking showed a significant positive impact on SMEs' export performance. Firm size was found to have positive impacts on foreign networking and export performance. Research limitations/implications – The study was limited to manufacturing SMEs in a particular region. Replications in other industries and regions are needed to validate the current findings. People from Finland, Norway and Sweden share similar cultural values and they are low on uncertainty-avoidance. Hence, they are not threatened by environmental uncertainties and, consequently, may not feel compelled to engage in networking to reduce uncertainty. Practical implications – The positive linkage between foreign networking and export performance suggests that public officials in these countries should encourage SMEs to strengthen their existing foreign networks and facilitate formation of new ones via trade missions in other countries. Originality/value – Understanding the role of networking, as a potential buffer between environmental uncertainty and export performance, should be of interest to both researchers and practitioners.

Masters of Commerce / The purpose of this study was to evaluate econometrically the effects of real exchange rate misalignment on South African exports between the period 1994 and 2015 using quarterly time-series data. Cointegration tests were done using the Johansen and Juselius approach. The study examined the effects of real exchange rate misalignment of the rand on South Africa’s exports, namely manufactured goods exports, automotive and chemical exports, mining exports, machinery and transport equipment exports and agricultural exports, on both an aggregate and a sectoral level.

With an annual growth of almost 20% since the year 2000, Indian merchandise exports exceeded 300 billion U.S. dollars in 2012. The country is becoming a major supplier to the world. However, companies sourcing products and operating in India are experiencing a variety of supply chain disruptions that impede their operations and finances. The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate the frequency, impact and severity of supply chain risks experienced by companies in India, as well as assess the usefulness of mitigation methods and enquire about future expected disruptions. It is hoped that the results will prepare managers to better prioritize their supply chain risk management efforts and investments. The scope of this study is upstream (sourcing and operations) disruptions that affected Indian supply chains over the past three years, including the areas of logistics and transportation. The methodology is a quantitative, empirical study, using a survey instrument in the form of a questionnaire distributed electronically to thousands of members of four prominent trade associations in India. The platform for the questionnaire is a modification of a traditional risk analysis progression: mapping, identifying, assessing, mitigating and improving, also dubbed "MIAMI". The main findings are that there are major and significant differences in severity (frequency and impact) between the thirteen risk categories presented. There are also significant group differences among the respondents. Traditional mitigation methods differ with respect to usefulness, and expected risks are somewhat different than past risks. Conclusions reached are that chronic risks such as inadequate transportation, logistics and utilities infrastructure, supplier and labor problems, and bureaucracy/red tape are more severe than highly publicized and visible risks such as natural disasters, terrorism and crime. Traditional mitigation methods are useful for many of the disruptions, but ineffective for non-physical risks. There is a certain optimism with respect to future infrastructure related disruptions. Limitations of the study include a relatively low response rate, the classic difficulty in risk analysis of comparing and scaling the impact of disruptions, and that it is not fine grained enough to fully describe any specific industry sectors. This study contributes to the field of supply chain risk management by adding crucial empirical information from a heretofore unexplored market.

This thesis is a collection of three essays that examine the macroeconomic impact of natural resource windfalls and the microeconomic impact of Chinese development finance. The aim is to understand how fiscal windfalls largely driven by events in the world affect economic development. The first chapter studies the impact of commodity related income gains on the number of exporters and the average export value per exporter within the manufacturing sector. A large body of theoretical and empirical literature showed that these windfalls could be detrimental to the manufacturing sector, but none untangled the margins through which the exports from the manufacturing sector adjusts to these windfalls. I exploit the exogenous variation in the windfalls generated by the increase in prices of all major commodities during the early 2000s to fill this gap in the literature. First, I find that manufacturing industries that historically had a relatively higher share of exports to value added ratio (more exportable) tend to be negatively affected relative to the other manufacturing industries at both margins. Secondly, the extensive margin is largely driven by entrants. i.e., the number of new exporting firms that enter more exportable industries decline relative to the less exportable industries. Thirdly, for the more exportable industries, the average export value per incumbent exporters industries decline while that of the new exporters increases relative to the less exportable industries. It has often been argued that countries that produce natural resources mobilize less non-resource tax revenues than other countries. In the second chapter, I exploit the arguably exogenous variation in the timing of giant oilfield discoveries to examine the impact of natural resource abundance on non-resource tax revenue. The timing of giant oilfield discoveries is arguably exogenous and thus renders them appealing to empirically examine this argument. This allows me to examine the performance of non-resource tax revenue effort before and immediately after discovery as well as the period corresponding to the inflow of revenues from the production. I find that non-resource tax revenues tend to increase in the period following the discovery before the onset of production and after production commences. This effect is due to an increase in non-resource indirect tax revenues. Further analysis shows that both the total and indirect non-resource tax revenues, experience an increase in only low- middle income countries. This effect is largely driven by an increase in the consumption of goods and services. Improvement in agricultural productivity plays a key role in the process of economic development. Investment in critical infrastructure has been documented in the literature as one of the pathways to boost agricultural productivity. In the third chapter, I study the causal impact of Chinese development finance on agricultural productivity in Tanzania, at the sub-national level. I combine household panel data with rich farm level information with geocoded Chinese development projects. I then exploit the within village level variation in the total number of Chinese financed development projects in a panel fixed effects model to examine their effects on agricultural productivity. I find a positive effect on agricultural productivity in villages that are located within 25 km of these projects. This is largely driven by economic infrastructure. The results are robust to alternative definitions of Chinese financed development projects. I also find that the potential mechanisms driving the results are agricultural commercialization and access to improved seeds. This suggests that these projects connect farmers to input and output markets.

No description available.

Las mypes constituyen un sector muy importante en el desarrollo de la economía del país por lo cual en la presente investigación se planteó como objetivo determinar el nivel de competitividad que tienen las mypes exportadoras de la región Lambayeque. Para lo cual se empleó un enfoque cuantitativo, de tipo básica, de nivel descriptivo y diseño no experimental, corte transversal, para lo cual se tuvo una población de 110 mypes y un muestreo tipo juicio de 49 mypes agroexportadoras de la región Lambayeque, empleándose como instrumento el mapa de competitividad proporcionado por el BID, y se obtuvo en los resultados que las empresas en estudio poseen un nivel muy bajo con un 53.1%, seguido de un nivel bajo con un 38.8%. Concluyendo así que, pese a la importancia del sector, este se ve afectado y no ha logrado incrementar su crecimiento en el mercado puesto que presenta diversas deficiencias. / The mypes constitute a very important sector in the development of the country's economy, which is why in the present investigation the objective was to determine the level of competitiveness that the exporting mypes of the Lambayeque region have. For which a quantitative, basic type, descriptive level and non-experimental design, cross-sectional approach was used, for which a population of 110 mypes and a type of proven trial of 49 agro-exporting mypes from the Lambayeque region were used, using As an instrument, the competitiveness map provided by the IDB, and it was obtained in the results that the companies under study have a very low level with 53.1%, followed by a low level with 38.8%. Thus, concluding that despite the importance of the sector, it is affected and has not been able to increase its growth in the market since it presents various deficiencies.

A fundamental requirement in agricultural trade is that imported products are safe, and do not pose a risk to human, animal and plant health. To address this issue, all countries maintain measures to ensure that imported food is safe for consumers, and to prevent the spread of disease among animals and plants. These measures, by their nature, can affect competitiveness by increasing the costs of imports or prohibiting them altogether. To ensure that these measures are used for their intended purpose and not as protectionist measures, WTO member countries signed the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary measures. A growing number of studies attempt to quantify the effects of SPS regulations on international trade flows. However, precious little research is dedicated to determining the effects of specific phytosanitary regulations on trade flows and, more importantly, questions regarding SPS regulations and their impact as "trade barriers" or "trade catalysts" remain to be settled. This thesis contributes to existing literature in two ways. First, a comprehensive and user friendly database on specific phytosanitary regulations faced by U.S. exports of onions, peas, walnuts, apples, cherries, grapes, peaches/nectarines, oranges and strawberries to 176 countries is developed for the period 1999-2009. Second, this database is used for an empirical investigation to determine how existing SPS regulations affect U.S. fruit and vegetable exports. The results indicate that initially, phytosanitary treatments act as "barriers" to trade. However, as exporters' experience grows, the negative impact of treatments is reduced and eventually eliminated. / Master of Science

This is the first book on the transformations wrought by Cambodia's 2002-08 economic boom. It explores the impact of the boom on governance, economic structure, and opportunities for the poor. It provides new insights into the relationship between economic growth and political stability in post-conflict societies. It is a cross-disciplinary study involving Cambodian and foreign scholars. From 2002, Cambodia underwent a visible economic transformation driven largely by such external factors as increased Chinese demand for primary commodities and a strong international demand for Cambodian garments. Apart from dramatic rates of economic growth, the boom involved the disappearance of forests and the decline of logging, the inflow of Chinese investment and the rise of indigenous capital, and the increased significance of remittances from garment workers and labour migrants. In addition, the impact of government policies on land registration and concessions transformed relations of production and, with them, the socio-economic and political environment in rural and urban Cambodia. "Cambodia's Economic Transformation" examines the political economy of the Cambodian boom, analysing the changing structure of the economy, the relationship between state and market, and outcomes for the poor. Not least, it focuses the role of the state in facilitating and controlling the market, and the way that this has affected the life chances of the poor. In so doing, it situates Cambodian experience within key debates in the wider political economy of Eastern Asia, scrutinizing the relationship between class formation, structures of governance and resource distribution.