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The Economic Effects of Removing Barriers to Trade in Telecommunications
Author(s) -
Verikios George,
Zhang Xiaoguang
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
world economy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.594
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1467-9701
pISSN - 0378-5920
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9701.2004.00606.x
Subject(s) - liberalization , foreign direct investment , telecommunications , economics , investment (military) , international trade , telecommunications service , free trade , international economics , distribution (mathematics) , business , computer science , market economy , mathematics , macroeconomics , mathematical analysis , politics , political science , law
This paper quantifies the impact on the economies of the world of complete liberalisation of trade in a key services sector, telecommunications, using a global general equilibrium model. Barriers to trade in telecommunications are highest in developing regions and lowest in developed regions. The paper uses new estimates of these barriers for telecommunications. The results indicate that completely liberalising trade in telecommunications would benefit the world as a whole in terms of increased production by 0.1 per cent. Although the distribution of gains among regions is not even, most regions are projected to gain from liberalising trade in telecommunications. In general, the regions with the highest barriers benefit most. The analysis demonstrates that commercial presence of foreign firms via foreign direct investment is an important mode of delivering telecommunications.