IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/glecrv/v37y2008i4p447-467.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

China and India in World Trade: Are the Asia Giants a Threat to Malaysia?

Author

Listed:
  • Evelyn Devadason

Abstract

With higher shares in world merchandise trade and improvements in product quality, China is better positioned than India in the near term for influencing global trade. From the Malaysian perspective, China represents a non-negligible share in Malaysia's trade. The trends in bilateral trade with both Giants however suggest that competition has intensified. Relative to India, China appears to promulgate a more influential role on Malaysia via higher commodity overlap in external markets, greater matched trade that is of vertical differentiation, distinct quality shifts and negative adjustment pressures. Within this broad rubric of trade-induced changes, there is no evidence of skill upgrading for Malaysia in trade expansion with both Giants. This mirrors the lack of product quality improvements and the low levels of export values of high quality varieties in matched trade. Hence trade induced changes from the Giants that have been cited to be favourable from the Malaysian perspective in previous studies, may have been grossly overstated.

Suggested Citation

  • Evelyn Devadason, 2008. "China and India in World Trade: Are the Asia Giants a Threat to Malaysia?," Global Economic Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(4), pages 447-467.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:glecrv:v:37:y:2008:i:4:p:447-467
    DOI: 10.1080/12265080802480936
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/12265080802480936
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/12265080802480936?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Robert C. Feenstra & Gordon H. Hanson, 1995. "Foreign Investment, Outsourcing and Relative Wages," NBER Working Papers 5121, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Lee Branstetter, 2006. "China's Embrace of Globalisation," Working Papers id:640, eSocialSciences.
    3. Dani Rodrik, 2006. "What's So Special about China's Exports?," China & World Economy, Institute of World Economics and Politics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 14(5), pages 1-19, September.
    4. Bernard Hoekman & Alan L. Winters, 2005. "Trade and Employment: Stylized Facts and Research Findings," Working Papers 7, United Nations, Department of Economics and Social Affairs.
    5. Grossman, G.M., 1998. "Imperfect Labour Contracts and International Trade," Papers 205, Princeton, Woodrow Wilson School - Public and International Affairs.
    6. Castro, Lucio & Olarreaga, Marcelo & Saslavsky, Daniel, 2006. "The impact of trade with China and India on Argentina’s manufacturing employment," MPRA Paper 538, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Andrew B. Bernard & J. Bradford Jensen & Stephen J. Redding & Peter K. Schott, 2007. "Firms in International Trade," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 21(3), pages 105-130, Summer.
    8. Stephen Machin & A Ryan & John Van Reenen, 1996. "Technology and Changes in Skill Structure: Evidence from an International Panel of Industries," CEP Discussion Papers dp0297, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    9. Robert Rowthorn, 2006. "The Renaissance Of China And India: Implications For The Advanced Economies," UNCTAD Discussion Papers 182, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
    10. Lederman, Daniel & Olarreaga, Marcelo & Soloaga, Isidro, 2007. "The growth of China and India in world trade : opportunity or threat for Latin America and the Caribbean?," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4320, The World Bank.
    11. Manasse, Paolo & Turrini, Alessandro, 2001. "Trade, wages, and 'superstars'," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 97-117, June.
    12. Mr. Ashoka Mody & Ms. Deniz O Igan & Ms. Stefania Fabrizio, 2007. "The Dynamics of Product Quality and International Competitiveness," IMF Working Papers 2007/097, International Monetary Fund.
    13. Donald J. Robbins, 1996. "Evidence on Trade and Wages in the Developing World," OECD Development Centre Working Papers 119, OECD Publishing.
    14. Lionel Fontagné & Michaël Freudenberg, 1997. "Intra-Industry Trade: Methodological Issues Reconsidered," Working Papers 1997-01, CEPII research center.
    15. Mick Silver, 2007. "Do Unit Value Export, Import, and Terms of Trade Indices Represent or Misrepresent Price Indices?," IMF Working Papers 2007/121, International Monetary Fund.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Pinelopi Koujianou Goldberg & Nina Pavcnik, 2007. "Distributional Effects of Globalization in Developing Countries," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 45(1), pages 39-82, March.
    2. Paolo Epifani & Gino Gancia, 2008. "The Skill Bias of World Trade," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(530), pages 927-960, July.
    3. Paolo Epifani, 2003. "Trade liberalization, Firm Performances and Labor Market Outcomes in the Developing World, what Can We Learn From Micro-Level Data?," Rivista italiana degli economisti, Società editrice il Mulino, issue 3, pages 455-486.
    4. Johannes Schwarzer, 2016. "Trade and Employment. An Overview," Discussion Notes 1601, Council on Economic Policies.
    5. Abdul Azhar & Robert Elliott, 2011. "A Measure of Trade Induced Adjustment in Volume and Quality Space," Open Economies Review, Springer, vol. 22(5), pages 955-968, November.
    6. Lucio Castro & Daniel Saslavsky, 2008. "Trade with China and India and Manufacturing Labour Demand in Argentina," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2008-108, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    7. Lücke, Matthias, 1999. "Sectoral value added prices, TFP growth, and the low-skilled wage in high-income countries," Kiel Working Papers 923, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    8. Jansen, Marion, 2000. "International trade and the position of European low-skilled labour," WTO Staff Working Papers ERAD-2000-01, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.
    9. Antonio Avalos & Andreas Savvides, 2006. "The Manufacturing Wage Inequality in Latin America and East Asia: Openness, Technology Transfer, and Labor Supply," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(4), pages 553-576, November.
    10. Kölling, Arnd & Mertens, Antje, 2020. "Exporting behavior and the demand for skills in German establishments," Working Papers 97, Berlin School of Economics and Law, Institute of Management Berlin (IMB).
    11. Pol Antràs & Esteban Rossi-Hansberg, 2009. "Organizations and Trade," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 1(1), pages 43-64, May.
    12. Tadashi Ito & Toshihiro Okubo, 2016. "Product Quality And Intra-Industry Trade," The Singapore Economic Review (SER), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 61(04), pages 1-22, September.
    13. Francisco Alcalá & Pedro Hernández, 2010. "Firms’ main market, human capital, and wages," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 1(4), pages 433-458, September.
    14. Charlier, Christophe & Guillou, Sarah, 2014. "Distortion effects of export quota policy: an analysis of the China-Raw Materials dispute," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 320-338.
    15. Fontanelli, Luca & Guerini, Mattia & Napoletano, Mauro, 2023. "International trade and technological competition in markets with dynamic increasing returns," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    16. Devadason, Evelyn, 2007. "Do Trading Partners Matter for Labour Market Inequality? The Malaysian Case," Review of Applied Economics, Lincoln University, Department of Financial and Business Systems, vol. 3(1-2), pages 1-14.
    17. Xing, Yuqing, 2012. "Processing trade, exchange rates and China's bilateral trade balances," Journal of Asian Economics, Elsevier, vol. 23(5), pages 540-547.
    18. Kien Trung Nguyen, 2014. "The impact of trade and investment liberalization on the wage skill premium: evidence from Vietnam," Departmental Working Papers 2014-20, The Australian National University, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics.
    19. Joy Mazumdar & Myriam Quispe-Agnoli, 2004. "Can capital-skill complementarity explain the rising skill premium in developing countries? evidence from Peru," FRB Atlanta Working Paper 2004-11, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
    20. Amit Khandelwal, 2010. "The Long and Short (of) Quality Ladders," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(4), pages 1450-1476.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:glecrv:v:37:y:2008:i:4:p:447-467. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RGER20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.