Vietnam’s Accession to the WTO: Ex-post Evaluation in a dynamic perspective

Vietnam has been part of countries intensively studied by CGE modellers for the past years. This rapidly growing economy has participated in a number of new bilateral agreements and has recently joined the World Trade Organisation (WTO), leading to numerous assessments of expected gains. Various _x001c_gures have been proposed for the latter, ranging from a few hundred million (Dimaranan et al., 2005) to dozens of billion dollars (RolandHolst et al., 2002), obtained under very diverse modelling assumptions. The particular context of rapid growth and structural changes of Vietnam makes this type of exercise delicate under the CGE framework. In this paper, we propose a new assessment of Vietnam accession in a dynamic approach. Our analysis bene_x001c_t from the ex-post perspective o_x001b_ered one year after the WTO's membership acceptation. We rely on a dynamic multi-region multi-sector CGE (MIRAGE model from CEPII) in a version incorporating duty-drawbacks modelling. Concerning WTO provisions, tari_x001b_ diminution commitments are taken into account at a _x001c_ne level thanks to the MAcMap-HS6 database. In addition to the standard assessment methodology, we show how baseline improvements allow better results. A particular attention is paid on the role of textile and garment sectors, an important issue in the negotiations. The sensitivity of the results to some di_x001b_erent assumptions on labour market or macro closure is also tested. Our results tends to show that gains for Vietnam linked to WTO accession are positive for merchandises commitments, but highly dependent on the evolution of textile and apparel sectors, whose exports were boosted by the commitments.