IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/sus/susewp/0225.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Northern Ireland’s Trade in Goods in an Era of Brexit Uncertainty: Firm-level Evidence

Author

Listed:
  • Ruby Acquah

    (University of Sussex)

  • Mattia Di Ubaldo

    (University of Sussex)

  • Michael Gasiorek

    (University of Sussex)

  • Barry Reilly

    (University of Sussex)

Abstract

This paper uses firm-level data to examine the impact of Brexit uncertainty and the implementation of the Withdrawal agreement on the trading patterns of Northern Ireland’s manufacturing, and wholesale and retail firms. There is some evidence that in the aftermath of the Withdrawal agreement the purchasing behaviour of the manufacturing firms shifted away from suppliers in Great Britain to suppliers in either Ireland or other parts of the EU. There appears to have been less of an impact on sales especially between the time of the Brexit referendum and actual Withdrawal. There is some evidence of a post-Withdrawal increase in sales to GB, especially for wholesale and retail, which may be indicative of the benefits of preferential dual-market access for NI firms. While overall measures of the regulatory burden arising from the post-Brexit trading arrangements were not found to exert a statistically significant effect on manufacturing trade activity, this does not apply to measures capturing third-party conformity assessment, which appear to have a negative postWithdrawal impact on NI firms’ trade with GB. These effects are primarily found to be larger for smaller firms, and non high-technology intensive firms as well as for the agri-food sector.

Suggested Citation

  • Ruby Acquah & Mattia Di Ubaldo & Michael Gasiorek & Barry Reilly, "undated". "Northern Ireland’s Trade in Goods in an Era of Brexit Uncertainty: Firm-level Evidence," Working Paper Series 0225, Department of Economics, University of Sussex Business School.
    • Handle: RePEc:sus:susewp:0225
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.sussex.ac.uk/webteam/gateway/file.php?name=wps-02-2025-(1).pdf&site=18
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Aaditya Mattoo & Nadia Rocha & Michele Ruta & Aaditya Mattoo, 2020. "Handbook of Deep Trade Agreements," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 34055, April.
    2. Graham Gudgin & Ken Coutts & Neil Gibson & Jordan Buchanan, 2017. "The Role of Gravity Models in Estimating the Economic Impact of Brexit," Working Papers wp490, Centre for Business Research, University of Cambridge.
    3. Steven Brakman & Harry Garretsen & Tristan Kohl, 2023. "EXITitis in the UK: Gravity Estimates in the Aftermath of Brexit," De Economist, Springer, vol. 171(2), pages 185-206, June.
    4. Nicholas Bloom & Philip Bunn & Scarlet Chen & Paul Mizen & Pawel Smietanka & Greg Thwaites & Garry Young, 2019. "Brexit and uncertainty: insights from the Decision Maker Panel," Bank of England working papers 780, Bank of England.
    5. Nicholas Bloom & Philip Bunn & Scarlet Chen & Paul Mizen & Pawel Smietanka & Greg Thwaites & Garry Young, 2018. "Brexit and Uncertainty: Insights from the Decision Maker Panel," Fiscal Studies, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 39(4), pages 555-580, December.
    6. Sergio Correia & Paulo Guimarães & Tom Zylkin, 2020. "Fast Poisson estimation with high-dimensional fixed effects," Stata Journal, StataCorp LLC, vol. 20(1), pages 95-115, March.
    7. Rebecca Freeman & Kalina Manova & Thomas Prayer & Thomas Sampson, 2022. "UK trade in the wake of Brexit," CEP Discussion Papers dp1847, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    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. Swati Dhingra & Thomas Sampson, 2022. "Expecting Brexit," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 14(1), pages 495-519, August.
    2. Nicholas Bloom & Philip Bunn & Scarlet Chen & Paul Mizen & Pawel Smietanka & Gregory Thwaites, 2019. "The impact of Brexit on UK firms," Bank of England working papers 818, Bank of England.
    3. Beniamino Quintieri & Giovanni Stamato, 2023. "Are preferential agreements beneficial to EU trade? New evidence from the EU–South Korea treaty," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(12), pages 3511-3541, December.
    4. Kazunobu Hayakawa & Hiroshi Mukunoki, 2023. "The magnification effect in global value chains," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(1), pages 141-157, February.
    5. Nguyen, Minh Hong & Trinh, Vu Quang, 2023. "U.K. economic policy uncertainty and innovation activities: A firm-level analysis," Journal of Economics and Business, Elsevier, vol. 123(C).
    6. Hong, T., 2021. "Revisiting the Trade Policy Uncertainty Index," Cambridge Working Papers in Economics 2174, Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge.
    7. Anand, Kartik & Gai, Prasanna & König, Philipp Johann, 2020. "Leaping into the dark: A theory of policy gambles," Discussion Papers 07/2020, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    8. Moshfique Uddin & Anup Chowdhury & Geoffrey Wood, 2022. "The resilience of the British and European goods industry: Challenge of Brexit," Industrial and Corporate Change, Oxford University Press and the Associazione ICC, vol. 31(4), pages 934-954.
    9. Holger Breinlich & Elsa Leromain & Dennis Novy & Thomas Sampson, 2019. "Exchange Rates and Consumer Prices: Evidence from Brexit," CESifo Working Paper Series 8001, CESifo.
    10. Karl‐Friedrich Israel, 2021. "The fiat money illusion: On the cost‐efficiency of modern central banking," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(6), pages 1701-1719, June.
    11. Jose Maria Barrero & Nicholas Bloom & Steven J. Davis, 2020. "COVID-19 Is Also a Reallocation Shock," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 51(2 (Summer), pages 329-383.
    12. Broadbent, Ben & Di Pace, Federico & Drechsel, Thomas & Harrison, Richard & Tenreyro, Silvana, 2019. "The Brexit vote, productivity growth and macroeconomic adjustments in the United Kingdom," Discussion Papers 51, Monetary Policy Committee Unit, Bank of England.
    13. Holger Breinlich & Valentina Corradi & Nadia Rocha & Michele Ruta & Joao M.C. Santos Silva & Tom Zylkin, 2021. "Machine Learning in International Trade Research ?- Evaluating the Impact of Trade Agreements," School of Economics Discussion Papers 0521, School of Economics, University of Surrey.
    14. Facundo Albornoz & Jake Bradley & Silvia Sonderegger, 2020. "The Brexit referendum and the rise in hate crime; conforming to the new norm," Discussion Papers 2020-12, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    15. Prusa, Thomas J. & Teh, Robert & Zhu, Min, 2022. "PTAs and the incidence of antidumping disputes," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 138(C).
    16. Hites Ahir & Nicholas Bloom & Davide Furceri, 2022. "The world uncertainty index," CEP Discussion Papers dp1842, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    17. Drinkwater, Stephen & Blackaby, David H. & Robinson, Catherine, 2024. "What Mattered Most in the Brexit Vote? Evidence from Detailed Regression and Decomposition Analysis," IZA Discussion Papers 16841, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Bai, Ye & Girma, Sourafel & Riaño, Alejandro, 2024. "Corporate acquisitions and firm-level uncertainty: Domestic versus cross-border deals," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 140(C).
    19. Naser Makarem & Harjinder Singh & Nigar Sultana & Darren Henderson, 2023. "Policy uncertainty and real activities manipulation: evidence from Brexit," Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting, Springer, vol. 61(4), pages 1415-1440, November.
    20. Patrizia Casadei & Simona Iammarino, 2021. "Trade policy shocks in the UK textile and apparel value chain: Firm perceptions of Brexit uncertainty," Journal of International Business Policy, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 4(2), pages 262-285, June.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D22 - Microeconomics - - Production and Organizations - - - Firm Behavior: Empirical Analysis
    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations
    • F14 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Empirical Studies of Trade
    • F15 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Economic Integration

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:sus:susewp:0225. 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: University of Sussex Business School Communications Team (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecsusuk.html .

    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.