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Exports of services: Indian experience in perspective

Author

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  • Barry Eichengreen
  • Poonam Gupta

Abstract

Purpose - This paper aims to survey India's experience with exporting services. The authors seek to show that the country's experience is unique in that modern tradable services are a significantly larger share of GDP than in other countries at comparable levels of economic development. This has not always been the case, however; India's out‐performance is limited to recent years. Policy initiatives, from trade reform to liberalization of domestic industrial and service sectors, were important for jump‐starting the process. Design/methodology/approach - This paper reviews the literature and evidence. It takes a close look at the Indian service sector and specifically information‐technology‐related (IT) services, seeking to situate the growth in service exports from India in its comparative context. The authors document the role that exports of services have played in the performance of the Indian economy in recent years. They seek to pinpoint the “take‐off” in Indian services output and establish the extent to which the country's success in exporting services is exceptional from an international point of view. And they discuss the extent to which India's performance as an exporter of services has been shaped by policies liberalizing the service sector itself and by liberalization of the manufacturing sector. Findings - Panel and country‐specific regressions for a cross section of countries point to the importance of a range of additional factors: overall economic development, communications infrastructure, access to foreign technology, and spillovers between the merchandise and service exports. Importantly, however, these factors, jointly or individually, do not wipe out the significance of a dummy variable for India. India, evidently, is a significant outlier as an exporter of services, and even more so as the period proceeds. Originality/value - The paper discusses the country's major policy initiatives, such as trade reforms and liberalization of domestic industrial and service sectors, and their importance for jump‐starting the process of services growth and its exports. Regression results show that, in addition to these policies, other factors such as overall economic development, communications infrastructure, access to foreign technology, and spillovers between the merchandise and service exports were important as well.

Suggested Citation

  • Barry Eichengreen & Poonam Gupta, 2013. "Exports of services: Indian experience in perspective," Indian Growth and Development Review, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 6(1), pages 35-60, April.
  • Handle: RePEc:eme:igdrpp:v:6:y:2013:i:1:p:35-60
    DOI: 10.1108/17538251311329540
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    Cited by:

    1. Gnangnon, Sèna Kimm, 2022. "Effect of the Duration of the Membership in GATT/WTO on Commercial Services Exports in Developing Countries," EconStor Preprints 262167, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    2. Eichengreen, Barry & Gupta, Poonam, 2012. "The Real Exchange Rate and Export Growth: Are Services Different?," MPRA Paper 43358, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Ignatius Abasimi & Long Vorlak & Agus Salim & Xuan Li, 2019. "Determinants of Export Service in Selected West African Countries," International Journal of Applied Economics, Finance and Accounting, Online Academic Press, vol. 5(2), pages 39-47.
    4. Manoranjan Sahoo, 2018. "Exchange Rate and Service Exports from India: A Nonlinear ARDL Analysis," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 38(2), pages 1090-1101.
    5. Sahoo, Pravakar & Dash, Ranjan Kumar, 2014. "India's surge in modern services exports: Empirics for policy," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 36(6), pages 1082-1100.
    6. Bahman Huseynli, 2023. "Effect of Exports of Goods and Services and Energy Consumption in Italy`s Service Sector," International Journal of Energy Economics and Policy, Econjournals, vol. 13(3), pages 254-261, May.
    7. Gnangnon, Sèna Kimm, 2020. "Aid for Trade and Services Export Diversification in Recipient-Countries," EconStor Preprints 210467, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    8. Sèna K. Gnangnon, 2021. "Aid for Trade and services export diversification in recipient countries," Australian Economic Papers, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(2), pages 189-225, June.
    9. Gnangnon, Sèna Kimm, 2020. "Effect of Poverty on Services Export Concentration in Developing Countries," EconStor Preprints 223178, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    10. Sampriti Das & Amiya Sarma, 2021. "Growth Behaviour of India’s Export of Services, 1975–2018," Foreign Trade Review, , vol. 56(3), pages 301-321, August.
    11. Richa Khurana & D. K. Nauriyal, 2017. "Dynamics of Services Exports in India," Millennial Asia, , vol. 8(2), pages 178-193, October.
    12. Sangita Dutta Gupta & Ajitava Raychaudhuri & Sushil Kumar Haldar, 2015. "Determinants of Exports of Information Technology in India," South Asia Economic Journal, Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka, vol. 16(1), pages 64-81, March.
    13. Basu, Deepankar & Das, Debarshi, 2015. "Service Sector Growth in India: A View from Households," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2015-10, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
    14. Cassini, Lorenzo, 2023. "Path-dependent productive specialization: Should prematurely deindustrialized countries shift to a KIBS export-led strategy?," Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, Elsevier, vol. 65(C), pages 199-209.
    15. Gnangnon, Sèna Kimm, 2021. "Effect of Multilateral Trade Liberalization on Services Export Diversification," EconStor Preprints 229152, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics.
    16. N.R. Bhanumurthy & Sukanya Bose & Swayamsiddha Panda, 2014. "Modelling India’s External Sector: Review and Some Empirics," Margin: The Journal of Applied Economic Research, National Council of Applied Economic Research, vol. 8(4), pages 457-493, November.
    17. Pravakar Sahoo & Ranjan Kumar Dash, 2017. "What Drives India's Surge in Service Exports?," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(2), pages 439-461, February.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Growth and development strategies; Trade policy; Exports; Services; India;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • F10 - International Economics - - Trade - - - General

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