Three essays on trade in services : exploring tradability, regional trade and government procurement of services

• Main Author: Shingal, Anirudh
• Published: University of Sussex 2009
• Subjects: 382.9
• Online Access: http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.496852

This thesis comprises three essays on trade in services that explore the issues of tradability, trade and market access. The essays are also empirical case studies of the form that liberalization may take. The first essay examines the role of regional trade agreements (RTAs) in services trade using a gravity model. It adds to this literature by (i) distilling trade effects of RTAs into those emanating from services and "only goods" agreements thereby confirming complementarities between the two; (ii) studying the impact of goods trade on services trade more directly than done hitherto; (iii) studying relationships between RTAs and services trade disaggregated by the economic status of the partner countries and by the nature of the relationship; and (iv) treating the RTA explanatory variable as endogenous in estimating the trade effect. Finally, it uses its results to estimate the trade effect of an India-EU RTA.