STRUKTUR PASAR DAN DAYA SAING KARET ALAM INDONESIA DI AMERIKA SERIKAT

Abstrak Karet alam Indonesia berperan penting dalam meningkatkan perekonomian nasional melalui ekspor karet alam ke berbagai negara, termasuk ke Amerika Serikat. Dalam upaya mengembangkan ekspor karet alamnya, Indonesia perlu melakukan kalkulasi posisi dan daya saing karet alam di antara negara-negara pesaing serta peluang pasarnya ke Amerika Serikat yang memiliki permintaan impor relatif tinggi. Tujuan penelitian ini adalah menganalisis struktur pasar, serta keunggulan komparatif dan kompetitif karet alam Indonesia di pasar Amerika Serikat. Analisis dilakukan selama periode tahun 2008-2019 menggunakan metode Herfindahl Index (HI), Concentration Ratio (CR4), Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA), Export Product Dynamic (EPD), dan Diamond’s Porter. Hasil analisis menunjukkan bahwa struktur pasar karet alam Indonesia cenderung oligopoli. Dibandingkan dengan negara-negara eksportir lainnya, karet alam Indonesia memiliki keunggulan komparatif di pasar Amerika Serikat. Keunggulan kompetitif karet alam Indonesia di Amerika Serikat mengalami penurunan dari posisi lost opportunity pada periode pertama (2008-2011) menjadi retreat pada periode ketiga (2016-2019). Hasil dari Diamond’s Porter menunjukkan bahwa terdapat tujuh faktor keunggulan kompetitif dan tiga faktor kelemahan dalam industri karet alam di Indonesia. Kata Kunci: Concentration Ratio, Diamond’s Porter, EPD, Herfindahl Index, RCA Abstract Indonesian natural rubber plays a significant role in improving the national economy through exports of natural rubber to various countries, including the United States. In an effort to develop its natural rubber exports, Indonesia needs to calculate the position and competitiveness of natural rubber among competing countries and its market opportunities to the United States, which has a relatively high import demand. The purpose of this study is to analyze the market structure, as well as the comparative and competitive advantages of Indonesian natural rubber in the United States market. The analysis was carried out during the period 2008-2019 using the methods Herfindahl Index (HI), Concentration Ratio (CR4), Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA), Export Product Dynamic (EPD), and Diamond's Porter. The results of the analysis show that the structure of the Indonesian natural rubber market tends to be an oligopoly. Compared to other exporting countries, Indonesian natural rubber has a comparative advantage in the United States market. The competitiveness of Indonesian natural rubber in the US decline over time from the lost opportunity position in the first period (2008-2011) to retreat in the third period (2016-2019). The Diamond's Porter results show that there are seven competitive advantage factors and three weakness factors in Indonesia's natural rubber industry. Keywords: Concentration Ratio, Diamond’s Porter, EPD, Herfindahl Index, RCA JEL Classification: F13, F15, F18

Lobbying in the Political Economy of International Trade

While the role of lobbying in trade policy determination has been studied in a formal way since the early 1980s, it was the pathbreaking 1994 work by Grossman and Helpman in the following decade that led many scholars, using that framework (often with some modifications), to study many interesting political economy issues in the trade policy arena. Importantly, Grossman and Helpman were also the first to provide microfoundations to lobbying within a multisectoral, specific-factors framework. Moreover, the industry-level protection they derive is an empirically estimable function of measurable industry characteristics and other political and economic factors. With everything else held constant, organized sectors are able to obtain higher protection than unorganized sectors, with organized-sector protection inversely related to import penetration and import demand elasticity. Grossman and Helpman’s work gave an impetus to theory-driven empirical work in the political economy of trade policy, including the empirical investigation of the Grossman–Helpman model itself and its many extensions. There is now also a fairly large literature trying to explain the unrealistically high empirical estimates of the model’s parameters (representing the proportion of population politically organized and the weight the government attaches to aggregate welfare relative to political contributions). Extensions for empirical investigation that include bringing in competition between upstream and downstream lobbies, imperfect capturing of nontariff barrier (NTB) rents by the government, foreign lobbies, the possibility of misclassfication of sectors into organized and unorganized, and so forth partially correct the unrealistic parameter estimates. In addition, there are extensions that have been applied toward explaining policy changes and puzzles. Those extensions deal with lobby formation, trade agreements, unilateralism versus reciprocity in trade policy, lobbying for protection in declining industries, firm-level lobbying, the choice of policy instruments, and so forth. Despite so much work already done on lobbying and trade policy, the existing literature is deficient in the study of the choice of instruments, the antitrade bias in trade policy, and informational lobbying.

Import Demand Function in India Under the Liberalised Trade Regime

The trade liberalisation policy was initiated in India in the 1980s but executed effectively since the early 1990s. Since then India’s foreign trade embarks on a new road with a rapid expansion of export and import. Over the period, import exceed export. Identifying factors influencing such a significant elevation of import is a relevant issue of research. This study appraises import demand function in India for the liberalised trade regime particularly, for an extended period 1980–2018, and for the post-reform period, 1992–2018. The study identifies domestic income in aggregated and disaggregated level with exchange rate, trade openness and population growth as significant determinants of import demand. The income has a positive impact on import demand, where income elasticity of import demand differs significantly across the aggregate income and its components—consumption, investment and export expenditure. The exchange rate has a negative impact, implies a depreciation of Indian currency decrease import demand. The trade openness causes a rise in import demand both in the long run and in the short run. Population growth also raises import demand. The econometric diagnostics corroborate the fact that the estimated import demand functions are stable and robust. JEL Codes: F10, F14, C22

Panama’s economy is poised for dramatic rebound

Significance Mining and quarrying activities (728%), construction (489%), hotels and restaurants (92%), transport and communications (29.8%) and trade (23.9%) were the main drivers of growth, boosted by an easing of mobility restrictions and stronger global trade flows. Impacts The 'Pandora Papers' investigation will cast further doubt on Panama’s anti-money laundering efforts. Large social and economic disparity between the Panama Canal area and the rest of the country will continue to hinder development. The Darien Gap is increasingly becoming a migration bottleneck which will necessitate international cooperation, especially with Colombia. Service activities related to the expansion of the Panama Canal will support growth in the coming years. Higher import demand boosted by economic recovery will weigh on external accounts this year.

Interlinking the Renewable Electricity and Gas Sectors: A Techno-Economic Case Study for Austria

Achieving climate neutrality requires a massive transformation of current energy systems. Fossil energy sources must be replaced with renewable ones. Renewable energy sources with reasonable potential such as photovoltaics or wind power provide electricity. However, since chemical energy carriers are essential for various sectors and applications, the need for renewable gases comes more and more into focus. This paper determines the Austrian green hydrogen potential, produced exclusively from electricity surpluses. In combination with assumed sustainable methane production, the resulting renewable gas import demand is identified, based on two fully decarbonised scenarios for the investigated years 2030, 2040 and 2050. While in one scenario energy efficiency is maximised, in the other scenario significant behavioural changes are considered to reduce the total energy consumption. A techno-economic analysis is used to identify the economically reasonable national green hydrogen potential and to calculate the averaged levelised cost of hydrogen (LCOH2) for each scenario and considered year. Furthermore, roll-out curves for the necessary expansion of national electrolysis plants are presented. The results show that in 2050 about 43% of the national gas demand can be produced nationally and economically (34 TWh green hydrogen, 16 TWh sustainable methane). The resulting national hydrogen production costs are comparable to the expected import costs (including transport costs). The most important actions are the quick and extensive expansion of renewables and electrolysis plants both nationally and internationally.

Competition Laws and Regulations For a Digital Industry Platform

During the last two decades, several nations have enacted or reinforced competition legislation. In most countries, at the same time, indigenous sectors are under ever-greater import demand. Towards an analysis, to monitor over time and the presence of imports and the number of domestic companies, on the influence of competitive legislation and rules (CLR) on the domestic competition for several nations. To see the direct impact of the Competition Law on competitiveness as industries with more import exposure or bigger local businesses are tending to be more competitive. However, it should be concluded that industries operating under competition legislation tend to have more domestic companies. This implies that by stimulating entrance, competition legislation may have an indirect influence on domestic competition. In terms of the function of government in industrial growth and the position of the public and private sector in country industrialization, the comparative role for small and big industries, an industrial policy may be described as the declaration of importance. It is essential to introduce new laws and regulations to encourage competition and constrain large industries. The problems of Industry 4.0 will be met through digitalization and automation. The vast amount of data produced on the industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) must be collected, understood, and used. This is precisely what the digital company does by integrating the real world with the digital world. Therefore, the endless quantity of data enables the industry to make the CLR-IIOT technique more sustainable by employing final resources efficiently. Competition results in greater economic dynamic efficiency through innovation, technical advancement, reduced prices, and improved quality and customer service. Competition legislation is necessary since the market may be affected by faults and distortions, and diverse consumers may have recourse to anti-competitive actions such as cartels, abuse of predomination, etc.

MEXICAN DEMAND FOR RICE IMPORTS (ORYZA SATIVA L.) DURING NAFTA: EVIDENCE FROM A NARDL MODEL WITH STRUCTURAL CHANGE AND OUTLIERS

ABSTRACT Objective: This study aimed to determine which model best captures the behaviour of rice imports during the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) regime (1994–2018). Methodology Mexican demand for rice imports is estimated with Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model (ARDL) and Nonlinear Autoregressive Distributed Lag Model (NARDL), both with and without structural change and outliers. Results It starts with the ARDL and NARDL models, obtaining non-cointegration, as well as diagnosis and specification problems. Subsequently an ARDL model is proposed with structural change and outliers, which represents an improvement but still has specification problems. Finally, the best model is obtained incorporating non-linearity. Limitations/Implications It is a study for a specific grain, so the results obtained are only valid for rice imports. Nevertheless, it must be considered that it is a basic grain. Moreover, a new methodology is used to estimate the import demand function. Findings There is evidence of an asymmetric response of rice imports to fluctuations in economic activity and the exchange rate in the short run, and only in the long run for the latter. An increase in rice imports with NAFTA is also confirmed, as well as two extraordinary variations of rice imports during the study period. Keywords Rice imports; ARDL; NARDL; structural change; outliers