From Global to Regional Telecom Production Sharing: Asia vs. America

This paper investigates the size and scope of global production sharing in the telecom sector by analysing the international pattern of trade in telecom parts and components using bilateral trade statistics over the period 1978-2000. The results show that since 1995 the US have taken over the role of major exporter of parts of telecom equipment to Japan who had dominated world exports of this category since 1978. The US are nowadays driving fragmentation of telecom production on a global scale, with Asia playing the role of most favoured production base for intermediate goods in the sector. However, there is evidence of: a decreasing share of total trade in parts between the US and Asia; of an increasing share of total trade in parts between the US and Mexico; of an increasing trade intensity within Asia. These findings suggest that the emergence of regional groupings both in the Americas and in Asia are likely to reverse the pattern of international fragmentation of production in the telecom sector from global to intra-block vertical division of labour.