مؤشرات رئيسة لتطور التجارة الزراعية البينية العربية[Key indicators for the Development of Arab-intra Agricultural Trade]

Foreign trade is an important focus in economic development and plays a major role in the global economy. One of the most important repercussions in this regard is the development of exports. Indicators of the development of Arab agricultural foreign trade during the period (2000 -2016), The study based upon published data from Regional and international bodies concerned. The Inter-Arab agricultural exports amounted to about $106 and 96 billion in 2015, 2016, respectively. According to the study, the Arab agricultural exports covered only 22.6%, 24% of its imports in 2015 and 2016, respectively. Egypt was ranked as the first in the descending ranking scale of Arab countries according to its export share in the total Arab agricultural exports, with a contribution of about 16%, followed by Syria and Saudi Arabia. With 13% each, and in terms of the development of the coverage of agricultural Intra-Arab exports the Intra- Arab agricultural imports, the aggregate Intra-Arab countries agricultural exports covered 123% of intra-Arab agricultural imports in 2011, such ratio fell to about 68% in 2012, and continued to decline until 2016. Sudan agricultural exports to Arab countries, has barely maintained its full coverage of inter-Arab agricultural imports, where such ratio of Sudanese market was about 102% in 2016. The inability of Arab domestic production to provide enough surplus for the export of agricultural goods with less commodities-standards capable of competing and penetrating markets at competitive prices and high quality. Such performances reflected the technological gap between Arab economies and world economies in terms of productivity and quality level. The estimate of the Hershman-Index for terms of trade of the main exports of agricultural commodity groups, generally showed that the Arab-inter-Arab exports tended to be diversified rather than concentrated, as the highest estimated value of such index was for “milk and dairy products” was about 0.37, followed by 0.24 for vegetables, 0.23 for fruits and 0.25 for live-animals. Three of these four groups are perishable commodities (milk, vegetables and fruits), whose marketing efficiency requires a network of processing industries, storage, packaging and specialized transport, which is in line with the strategy of quantitative and qualitative diversification of exports. The added value of the live animal trade increases by the establishment of a modern meat processing industry and the processing of by-products, particularly, the hide and edible offal. In order to highlight the most important Arab markets exporting these first four commodity groups to Arab countries, the estimate of geographical concentration for the period (2012-2016) showed that the most important exporters of dairy group are Saudi Arabia by 33%, followed by Egypt at 13%, but the increase in Saudi Arabia’s contribution to dairy exports was due to the intensification of investment in an activity that wasted limited resources and led to the growth of milk production and products by about 7.7% per year, against the growth of an effective demand for milk by about 5% per year, with high production costs and the depletion of 500 tons of fresh water to produce and process 1-ton of milk, despite fresh sweet water scarcity with high social costs. The prices of imported dairy products reached 50% of domestic production, with the absence of the comparative advantage of Saudi Arabia in the agricultural sector. Sudan is the most important Arab exporter of live animals at 21% of the total Arab exports of this commodity group because of the intensive exports to Saudi Arabia as a sacrifice in the hajj season, the most important exporter of fruit group is Egypt with 26%, followed by Syria at 15%, Jordan at 12%. Jordan stands out as the most important Arab market exporting vegetable selections to Arab countries, despite the high scarcity of its natural agricultural resources from soil and water, because Jordan has utilized effectively its geographic location advantage and applied modern advanced technologies (protected agriculture), (sprinkle and drip irrigation systems), and (high yield varieties), and enjoyed regional preference in receiving economic assistance from major countries, global economic blocs and international financial organizations. It focused its vegetables and fruits exports towards Arab Gulf countries and Iraq.