This paper paints the first empirical portrait of services firms in the developing world. Compared with manufacturers, service providers are smaller, but growing faster. They are more productive, pay higher wages, and invest more heavily than manufacturers, but are less likely to export or to...

This paper analyzes the role of vertical differentiation linked with global production networks in increasing the chance of export survival using highly disaggregated machinery exports data from Turkey for the 1998-2013 period. Results obtained from the descriptive statistics analysis suggest...

Existing research generally finds weak positive effects of aid for trade (AfT) on aggregate merchandise trade of recipients once endogeneity in the AfT-trade relationship is accounted for. In this paper, we confirm weak findings for both aggregate merchandise and services trade of recipients,...

The empirical literature on aid for trade (AfT) mainly considers its effects on merchandise trade and investment. In this paper we examine the relationship between AfT and trade in services as well as trade in goods over 2002-2015 in both aggregate and bilateral analysis. We observe...

This paper on Trade Agreements within SSA, is an assessment of the ex post bilateral trade effect of the European Union-African Caribbean Pacific Preferential Trade Agreement (EU-ACP PTA) and sub-regional regional trade agreements (RTAs) on bilateral trade involving SSA countries. The main...

COVID-19 has raised questions about the resilience of agri-food trade to global shocks to the system. This paper analyses the changes in agri-food trade (values, extensive and intensive margin, and diversification) during the pandemic at global and regional levels. It also considers parallels in...

Developing countries became less hostile to transnational service corporations (TNSCs), but many still confine TNSCs to selected industries and specific market segments. Given that services, and especially producer services, are inputs into other industries, the unintended effect of restrictions...

The scholarship on Global Value Chains is very recently recognising the increasing importance of fragmentation of production that involves services – and in particular business services – offshoring. A predominant stand by scholars emerges in this embryonic domain (Blinder, 2006; Gereffi and...

The aim of this paper is to analyse developing countries' participation so far in the current round of services negotiations under the Doha Development Agenda. The paper analyses developing countries' negotiating positions, as evidenced by their multilateral negotiating proposals; their initial...