Iranian Journal of Trade Studies
Year:2011 | Volume:15 | Issue:57|Papers Count:8

The promotion of human welfare is undoubtedly one of the greatest challenges of economic development. To this end, the last decade saw several developing countries embracing globalization and in particular, significantly lowering barriers to trade. This paper employs a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model to investigate the welfare impact of tariff liberalization. The Hicksian Equivalent Variation (EV) captures the welfare change. Needed data were obtained from the social accounting matrix of year 2001 in which parameters of model were calibrated accordingly. Three scenarios were examined: import tariff rate reduction on 1) agricultural sector, 2) non-agricultural sectors, and 3) all sectors. All scenarios result in overall economy-wide welfare with respect to the base. The EV increased by nearly 65, 3047, and 3112 billion rials in scenarios 1, 2 and 3 respectively with 100% reductions on import tariffs. JEL Classification: I31, R13, F13, C68.

Analysis of ICT impacts on the economic performance has been started since 1990s. Researches have found that ICT have remarkable effect on TFP in both developed and some of developing countries. The aim of this paper is to investigate the impacts of ICT on the TFP in 37 developing countries using Panel Data method in the period of 1995-2003. This paper uses three types of variables for ICT; fixed line phone penetration, network index and ICT capital stock (ICT infrastructure), internet penetration and ICT-use index (ICT usage), and ICT expenditure (spillover effect) to estimate the benefits of ICT. Findings indicate fixed line phone and internet penetration, network index, ICT-use index, ICT capital stock over total capital stock, human capital; saving rate and trade openness have positive effect on the TFP in developing countries. The elasticity of TFP relative to infrastructure and usage is 0.065 and 0.025 respectively. In other words, one percent improvement in infrastructure, usage and ICT expenditure can increase TFP more than 0.09 percent. JEL Classification: D24, L63.

Trade openness as an index of globalization has an effect on exchange rate volatility. In this paper, the impact of trade openness on real exchange rate volatility has been investigated by using annual time series data in Iran over 1971-2005. The GARCH model is used to estimate real exchange volatility. The empirical model has been estimated by using Johansen's multivariate co-integration method, the main results indicate that the trade openness has a negative impact on real exchange rate volatility and both real GDP per capita and inflation have positive and significant effects on real exchange rate volatility. JEL Classification: C22, E31, F31.

The constant increase of counterfeiting and piracy and the negative impact on trade, public health and safety in both developing and developed economies make the combat against this phenomenon a formidable challenge for all WTO Members. The TRIPS Agreement contains a comprehensive chapter on enforcement in Part III and special requirements related to border measures detailed in Section 4, thus recognizing border measures as an effective tool in the fight against counterfeiting and piracy. This article analyzes aspects of border measures and Their important highlights. JEL Classification: O34, L15.

This article aims to investigate the relationship between fuel demand and economic growth in the period of 1966-2005 using the Vector Auto Regressive (VAR) methods and Granger causality test and Vector Error Correction estimation (VEC) and Johansen Cointegration test. The results suggest a long term relation between gasoline annual consumption and gross domestic product (GDP). The results of variance decomposition show that GDP has the highest impact on itself and the gasoline consumption variation is mainly defined by the GDP. Incorporating gas oil annual consumption, the results of variance decomposition show that GDP has the highest impact on itself and the gas oil annual consumption variation is mainly defined by GDP. The results of estimation incorporating gas oil annual consumption to the model show that that GDP has the highest impact on itself and the gas oil annual consumption variation is mainly defined by itself. The Granger causality test runs one-way from GDP to gasoline annual consumption and not the other way but it does not show any relationship between GDP and gas oil annual consumption. The results of VEC estimation confirm the results of granger causality test. The Johansen Cointegration test shows a relation between GDP and gasoline and gas oil annual consumption in long term. JEL Classification: O40, L91.

The stated basic goal of regional trade organizations (agreements) is reducing tariff barriers and improving welfare at the regional level. But there are serious questions regarding the effect of these agrreements on trade in member versus non-member countries If the agreement yields positive trade effect in member countries, the phenomenon is called “trade creation". If this positive effect comes at the expense of negative effect on non-member countries, the phenomenon is called “trade diversion”. Trade creation is welfare improving, while trade diversion is welfare reducing. This paper is an attempt to measure the extent of trade diversion and trade creation in three Asian organizations, namely, the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO), Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and ASEAN. The model used is an extended version of the relatively well known gravity model and a total of 26 member countries were considered for data completion purposes over the time span of 2002-2006. The findings reveal an incidence of trade diversion in all three cases, implying that trade agreements are welfare reducing. JEL Classification: F51, L42.

One of the non-judicial sanctions which have been foreseen in some legal systems for protecting the sellers rights in the event of violating the obligations by the buyer is the resale of goods. The requirements of creating this right, and the manner of its applying is different in various legal systems. But, its main substance is the sellers right without recourse to the court. The important issue in this respect, is deciding about the acquired profits resulted from resale. It belongs to the seller in American and English laws. But, according to the UN Convention on International Sale of Goods, it belongs to the buyer. In Iranian law, there is no place for the resale rule and, resale of goods by the seller before rescinding the contract is considered possession in the third parties property and, it will be subject to the regulations of unauthorized transactions. JEL Classification: F1, F15, F02.

Nowadays, the foreign trade is considered as one of the most significant economical aspects of all countries particularly of the developing countries. The estimation of import demand has always been a great concern and a challenging issue for the economic and political authorities specially in the national, local and international strategic decision-markings. In this research, the type and the amount of the effects of some elements such as; the relative costs, the oil and gas revenues, the gross national product without considering oil and gas and the mine and industry value added on each of the import functions have been discussed. The results show that the previous period imports is a significant meaning for all three functions and has the most influence on the imports of the consumer goods while it has the least influence on the import of the capital goods. The import demand pricing has the highest elasticity for the intermediate goods and the lowest for the consumer goods. Finally, the gas and oil export revenues and also the mine and industry value added have the most influence on the import of the capital goods. JEL Classification: C32, C13, F10.