IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/unu/wpaper/rp2008-32.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

The Optimal Distance to Port for Exporting Firms

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas Gries
  • Wim Naudé
  • Marianne Matthee

Abstract

Success in international trade depends, amongst other things, on distance from markets. Most new economic geography models focus on the distance between countries. In contrast much less theorizing and empirical analysis have focused on how distances within a country—for instance due to the location behaviour of exporting firms—matter to international trade. In this paper we contribute to the literature on the latter by offering a theoretical model to explain the optimal distance that an export-oriented firm would locate from a port.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Gries & Wim Naudé & Marianne Matthee, 2008. "The Optimal Distance to Port for Exporting Firms," WIDER Working Paper Series RP2008-32, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
  • Handle: RePEc:unu:wpaper:rp2008-32
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.wider.unu.edu/sites/default/files/rp2008-32.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Anthony J. Venables, 2006. "Shifts in economic geography and their causes," Proceedings - Economic Policy Symposium - Jackson Hole, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, pages 15-39.
    2. Giorgio Basevi & Gianmarco I.P. Ottaviano, 2002. "The District and the Global Economy: Exportation Versus Foreign Location," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 42(1), pages 107-126, February.
    3. Clark, Ximena & Dollar, David & Micco, Alejandro, 2004. "Port efficiency, maritime transport costs, and bilateral trade," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(2), pages 417-450, December.
    4. E. Anthon Eff & Steven G. Livingston, 2007. "Is There A Rural/Urban Export Gap?," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(2), pages 339-363, May.
    5. David L. Hummels & Georg Schaur, 2013. "Time as a Trade Barrier," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(7), pages 2935-2959, December.
    6. Ellison, Glenn & Glaeser, Edward L, 1997. "Geographic Concentration in U.S. Manufacturing Industries: A Dartboard Approach," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 105(5), pages 889-927, October.
    7. Dasgupta, Madhuchhanda & Mishra, SK, 2004. "Least absolute deviation estimation of linear econometric models: A literature review," MPRA Paper 1781, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. James E. Anderson & Eric van Wincoop, 2004. "Trade Costs," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 42(3), pages 691-751, September.
    9. Fujita, Masahisa & Mori, Tomoya, 1996. "The role of ports in the making of major cities: Self-agglomeration and hub-effect," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 93-120, April.
    10. Fujita,Masahisa & Thisse,Jacques-François, 2013. "Economics of Agglomeration," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107001411.
    11. Martin, Philippe & Rogers, Carol Ann, 1995. "Industrial location and public infrastructure," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3-4), pages 335-351, November.
    12. Alejandro Micco & Tomas Serebrisky, 2004. "Infrastructure, Competition Regimes and Air Transport Costs: Cross Country Evidence," Research Department Publications 4369, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    13. Head, Keith & Ries, John & Swenson, Deborah, 1995. "Agglomeration benefits and location choice: Evidence from Japanese manufacturing investments in the United States," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(3-4), pages 223-247, May.
    14. Davis, Donald R. & Weinstein, David E., 2003. "Market access, economic geography and comparative advantage: an empirical test," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 1-23, January.
    15. Haiwen Zhou, 2007. "Oligopolistic Competition And Economic Geography," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 47(5), pages 915-933, December.
    16. Henry Overman & Stephen Redding & Anthony J. Venables, 2001. "The Economic Geography of Trade, Production, and Income: A Survey of Empirics," CEP Discussion Papers dp0508, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    17. Audretsch, David B & Feldman, Maryann P, 1996. "R&D Spillovers and the Geography of Innovation and Production," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(3), pages 630-640, June.
    18. I Martínez-Zarzoso & L García-Menéndez & C Suárez-Burguet, 2003. "Impact of Transport Costs on International Trade: The Case of Spanish Ceramic Exports," Maritime Economics & Logistics, Palgrave Macmillan;International Association of Maritime Economists (IAME), vol. 5(2), pages 179-198, June.
    19. Traistaru, Iulia & Iara, Anna & Pauna, Carmen, 2002. "Regional structural change and growth in Romania," ERSA conference papers ersa02p330, European Regional Science Association.
    20. Donald R. Davis & David E. Weinstein, 2002. "Bones, Bombs, and Break Points: The Geography of Economic Activity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1269-1289, December.
    21. Lawrence Edwards & Phil Alves, 2006. "South Africa'S Export Performance: Determinants Of Export Supply," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 74(3), pages 473-500, September.
    22. Ibrahim Elbadawi & Taye Mengistae & Albert Zeufack, 2006. "Market access, supplier access, and Africa's manufactured exports: A firm level analysis," The Journal of International Trade & Economic Development, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 15(4), pages 493-523.
    23. Micco, Alejandro & Serebrisky, Tomas, 2004. "Infrastructure, competition regimes, and air transport costs: cross-country evidence," Policy Research Working Paper Series 3355, The World Bank.
    24. Hummels, David, 2001. "Time As A Trade Barrier," Working papers 28701, Purdue University, Center for Global Trade Analysis, Global Trade Analysis Project.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Chad R. Wilkerson & Megan D. Williams, 2010. "The export potential of Tenth District states," Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, vol. 95(Q III), pages 93-114.
    2. Hernandez-Villafuerte, Karla Vanessa, 2011. "Relationship Between Spatial Price Transmission And Geographical Distance In Brazil," 2011 International Congress, August 30-September 2, 2011, Zurich, Switzerland 114545, European Association of Agricultural Economists.
    3. Nguyen, Cuong & Tran, Tuyen & Vu, Huong, 2021. "The Long-Term Effects of War on Foreign Direct Investment and Economic Development: Evidence from Vietnam," MPRA Paper 111891, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    4. Pedro Albarran & Raquel Carrasco & Adelheid Holl, 2013. "Domestic transport infrastructure and firms’ export market participation," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 40(4), pages 879-898, May.
    5. Naudé, Wim & Matthee, Marianne, 2012. "Do Export Costs Matter in Determining Whether, When, and How Much African Firms Export?," Working Papers 38, JICA Research Institute.
    6. Wim Naudé & Marianne Matthee, 2011. "The impact of transport costs on new venture internationalisation," Journal of International Entrepreneurship, Springer, vol. 9(1), pages 62-89, March.
    7. Jason Query, 2020. "Differing trade elasticities for intra‐ and international distances: A gravity approach," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(3), pages 913-929, August.

    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. Ikumo Isono, 2011. "Economic Integration and the Expansion of Trade and Transport Networks," Chapters, in: Masahisa Fujita & Ikuo Kuroiwa & Satoru Kumagai (ed.), The Economics of East Asian Integration, chapter 13, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Fabling, Richard & Grimes, Arthur & Sanderson, Lynda, 2013. "Any port in a storm: Impacts of new port infrastructure on exporter behaviour," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 33-47.
    3. Miren Lafourcade & Jacques-François Thisse, 2011. "New Economic Geography: The Role of Transport Costs," Chapters, in: André de Palma & Robin Lindsey & Emile Quinet & Roger Vickerman (ed.), A Handbook of Transport Economics, chapter 4, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    4. Stef Proost & Jacques-François Thisse, 2019. "What Can Be Learned from Spatial Economics?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 57(3), pages 575-643, September.
    5. Bianka Dettmer & Andreas Freytag & Peter Draper, 2013. "Check-in, departure and arrival times: Air cargo in Southern Africa?," Jena Economics Research Papers 2013-018, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
    6. Ducruet, César & Itoh, Hidekazu & Berli, Justin, 2020. "Urban gravity in the global container shipping network," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    7. Head, Keith & Mayer, Thierry, 2004. "The empirics of agglomeration and trade," Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, in: J. V. Henderson & J. F. Thisse (ed.), Handbook of Regional and Urban Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 59, pages 2609-2669, Elsevier.
    8. Naudé, Wim, 2009. "Geography, transport and Africa’s proximity gap," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 17(1), pages 1-9.
    9. Benjamin Bridgman, 2008. "Energy Prices and the Expansion of World Trade," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(4), pages 904-916, October.
    10. Miren Lafourcade & Jacques-François Thisse, 2008. "New economic geography: A guide to transport analysis," Working Papers halshs-00586878, HAL.
    11. Benjamin Bridgman, 2008. "Energy Prices and the Expansion of World Trade," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 11(4), pages 904-916, October.
    12. Gordon H. Hanson, 2000. "Scale Economies and the Geographic Concentration of Industry," NBER Working Papers 8013, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/10191 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Dettmer, Bianka & Freytag, Andreas & Draper, Peter, 2014. "Air Cargo beyond Trade Barriers in Africa," Journal of Economic Integration, Center for Economic Integration, Sejong University, vol. 29, pages 95-138.
    15. Stephen J. Redding, 2010. "The Empirics Of New Economic Geography," Journal of Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 50(1), pages 297-311, February.
    16. Peter Wostner, 2003. "Regional Disparities in Transition Economies: the case of Slovenia," SCIENZE REGIONALI, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2003(1).
    17. Christophe Gouel & Nina Kousnetzoff & Hassan Salman, 2008. "Commerce international et transports : tendances du passe et prospective 2020," Working Papers 2008-28, CEPII research center.
    18. Stephen J. Redding & Daniel M. Sturm & Nikolaus Wolf, 2011. "History and Industry Location: Evidence from German Airports," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(3), pages 814-831, August.
    19. Takatoshi Tabuchi & Kristian Behrens & Andrea R. Lamorgese, 2004. "Testing the Home Market Effects in a Multi-country World: The Theory," Econometric Society 2004 Far Eastern Meetings 595, Econometric Society.
    20. Julio Martinez-Galarraga & Daniel A. Tirado & Rafael González-Val, 2015. "Market potential and regional economic growth in Spain (1860–1930)," European Review of Economic History, European Historical Economics Society, vol. 19(4), pages 335-358.
    21. Douglas H. Brooks, 2010. "Regional Cooperation, Infrastructure, and Trade Costs in Asia," Working Papers id:3090, eSocialSciences.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    International trade; Manufacturing;

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:unu:wpaper:rp2008-32. 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: Siméon Rapin (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/widerfi.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.