This working paper introduces the concept of bilateral asymmetries in international merchandise trade statistics (IMTS), i.e. the discrepancies that can be seen in reported bilateral trade flows between trading partners. Such discrepancies mean that the value of exports reported by one country...

Financial development plays an important role in the structure of the trade balance and promoting economic development. Trade literature suggests that differences in economies’ endowments of labour, land, physical capital and technology explain the dynamics and patterns of international trade...

This working paper introduces the concept of Trade in Value Added (TiVA) and presents an initial analysis of TiVA for selected regional ESCAP economies. The paper introduces Global Value Chains (GVCs) and issues for the measurement of trade statistics due to proliferation of GVCs. It further...

We employ the structural model of trade and investment from Anderson, Larch and Yotov (2017) in order to quantify the impact of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and trade liberalization on exports and real GDP per capita in the Asia-Pacific region. Using a dataset of 89 countries for 2011, which...

The proliferation of RTAs is a central feature of the world trade policy environment in the last 20 years. This paper provides an empirical study of the extent to which the formation of RTAs has changed the distribution of world goods trade among trading partners. To do this, it constructs a new...

Trade and investment can be effective means of implementation of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. However, stand-alone trade and investment liberalization policies aimed at enhancing economic development may have negative side-effects on non-economic facets of sustainable development. As...

The Trans-Pacific-Partnership (TPP) trade agreement, if successfully implemented, will liberalize trade between the US, Japan and ten other Asia-Pacific economies, making it one of the largest regional agreements ever seen. The prospect of a comprehensive trade agreement spanning the Pacific...

Growing demand for raw materials and the expansion of the productive capacity of emerging economies have exacerbated the region’s high resource dependence, especially in energy, such as fossil fuels. A growth in energy demand, coupled with the high price volatility and dependence on fossil...