Trade Costs and Development : A New Data Set
The World Bank and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) jointly prepared a new global data set of bilateral trade costs based on trade and production data. Accessible on the World Bank Open Data Web s...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Brief |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2014
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2013/01/17210528/trade-costs-development-new-data-set http://hdl.handle.net/10986/17051 |
| Summary: | The World Bank and the United Nations
Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific
(UNESCAP) jointly prepared a new global data set of
bilateral trade costs based on trade and production data.
Accessible on the World Bank Open Data Web site, it opens
new analytical possibilities for policy makers and
researchers working on trade integration. The data stress
the importance of supply chains and connectivity constraints
in explaining the higher costs and lower levels of trade
integration observed in developing countries. To measure
trade costs in the developing world over the 1995-2010
period, UNESCAP and the World Bank embarked on a joint data
collection exercise. In addition to data on export and
import flows, calculation of trade costs using the inverse
gravity methodology also requires information on domestic
production in each country. Usage can then be calculated as
domestic production less total exports. The result of the
data collection exercise is a database covering up to 178
countries, two sectors, and the 1995-2010 period. Based on
the available data, trade costs data are calculated for as
many bilateral pairs as possible, and interpolation used to
fill in missing country- year combinations when feasible. |
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