Foreign Trade, FDI, and Capital Flows Study
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Publication
Special Economic Zones and Industrial Parks in South Asia: An Assessment of Their Regulatory Structures
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-11-10)This paper reviews the policies and regulations for special economic zones and other spatial development modalities in the countries within proximity of the Eastern Corridor in South Asia, and it assesses whether those policies and regulations are effectively designed. The assessment finds mixed results. On the positive side, governments in these countries exhibit a strong political commitment to the zones’ success, providing them with dedicated policies of both fiscal incentives and regulatory concessions, combined with administrative simplification to help zone developers and tenant enterprises. However, these arrangements include some notable shortfalls. For example, some incentives are inconsistent with the zone objectives, violate some international regulations, or miss necessary business facilitation measures. Moreover, there is no mechanism to evaluate the effectiveness and cost-efficiency of different incentives. Zone tenancy requirements are not always well specified, feasible, or consistent with zone objectives. As for the regulatory and institutional structures of zone programs, there are some common shortfalls, especially in terms of (a) clarity of zone objectives, (b) the roles of different agents, (c) the autonomy and inclusivity of those agents, and (d) the agents’ authority to carry out their responsibilities, and there are some shortfalls in the resources that agents need to manage operations effectively. To maximize the benefits from these zones, governments of the region could adopt reforms to ensure that incentives and tenancy requirements are aligned with zone objectives and that regulatory frameworks are clear, fair, and effective. -
Publication
Digital Pakistan: A Business and Trade Assessment
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-05)This report analyses the recent trends in Pakistani Information Technologies (IT) and InformationTechnologies enabled Services (ITeS), as well as obstacles confronted by firms. The authors assess the importance of trade costs as a barrier to services growth and development in Pakistan’s domestic market and to seizing the opportunities of global trade. The report also aims to understand and examine the impact of obstacles (i.e., trade costs) confronted by firms. These obstacles increase the costs of selling services and may reduce capacity to compete both in the local market (Pakistan) as well as overseas (exports). These obstacles include direct costs generated by policy barriers that limit market entry, but can also include infrastructure deficiencies, geographical location, and institutional capacities, and/or obstacles imposed by regulatory measures. Among the latter obstacles, examples include difficulties in accessing the information necessary to operate in a market, the predictability and stability of the business environment in a market, and the quality of the decision-making process and administrative procedures of competent authorities in the domestic and export markets. The focus of the report is the trade costs confronted by IT and ITeS firms. IT and ITeS operations are the backbone to provide digital services, digital goods and depend on digital technologies, conform an integral part of the overall ecosystem. The report relies on a survey conducted on 782 IT and ITeS firms across different cities. The objective of the survey was to examine the importance of these factors for Pakistani firms and to provide advice to policymakers. To complement the survey results, the main findings were discussed in focus group structured interviews. Firms interviewed covered different services activities beyond software companies and included both exporters (534 firms) and non-exporters (248 firms), reflecting the export competitiveness as well as domestic competitiveness of Pakistan's IT services sector. The analysis aims to improve our understanding of Pakistan's IT performance and the obstacles confronted in this field. -
Publication
Import Duties and Performance: Some Stylized Facts for Pakistan
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2020-05)This note discusses the role that import duties have in Pakistan’s economy, and their links with export competitiveness. Import duties play two key roles. First, they are a source of tax revenues for governments. Second, when imposed on a product, they create a wedge between its world price, and the price paid domestically (as well as a wedge between its domestic price, and the price of its substitute in the domestic economy). These wedges affect the allocation of resources. They divert resources away from export markets - in which firms will only fetch world prices for the product - and into the domestic market, effectively creating an anti-export bias. Thus, an import duty is implicitly an export duty. When these duties are applied on inputs that different sectors use to produce, the duty induces firms to substitute away from that - now more expensive - input, and into other substitutes, thus affecting the otherwise optimal technological choice of firms, as well as increasing their production costs. This note is organized as follows: the first section presents a snapshot of import duties in Pakistan. The second section empirically examines the ways import duties induce an allocation of resources that is different from the one that will be obtained without the duty distortion. The third section looks at the role of tariff policy in the context of the COVID-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic. The fourth section briefly describes the recent changes in the tariff policy institutional arrangement. The fifth section concludes and provides policy recommendations moving forward. -
Publication
Modernizing Trade in Pakistan: Policy Reform Handbook
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-09)This handbook intends to be a resource for those interested in trade policy reform, in Pakistan and elsewhere. It arose from the Pakistan trade and investment policy program (PTIPP). The PTIPP was designed to work on trade, competitiveness, and gender in Pakistan. This handbook focuses on two pillars of the PTIPP: trade policy and trade facilitation. The objective of the trade policy pillar was to develop a comprehensive medium-term regional trade strategy underpinned by high-quality analysis, in line with international good practice. The objective of the trade facilitation pillar was to reduce the time, cost, and documentation required to process exports and imports through key border posts, leading to a substantial increase in the volume of goods traded. To achieve these objectives, the PTIPP engaged with policy-making institutions, the private sector, including female entrepreneurs, and government to promote international trade, investment, gender equality, and regional integration. The authors focused on producing a document that not only lists results and recommendations but also guides the reader through how the analysis was conducted and how the recommendations were reached. This handbook also provides a set of guidelines for analyzing competitiveness in any country and shows how the lessons learned in Pakistan can apply to other economies. It will therefore be useful for teams conducting competitiveness analyses in other countries and regions. -
Publication
Pakistan: Unlocking Private Sector Growth through Increased Trade and Investment Competitiveness
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-10)Evidence suggests that Pakistan has the potential for much faster and more diversified economic growth. Energizing trade can help Pakistan to realize its growth potential. Pakistan’s inward-oriented trade policies have had the effect of stalling Pakistan’s integration into regional and global value chains (GVCs). Pakistan’s failure to reform its trade policy to better foster export competitiveness can be attributed in part to institutional fragmentation within the government. This fragmentation has resulted in different agencies sometimes working at cross purposes. Efforts to reduce tariffs have been offset by the introduction of alternative protection instruments such as regulatory duties (RDs) and firm-specific special regulatory orders (SROs). In addition to tariffs, RDs and SROs, other obstacles to global integration include a heavy regulatory burden and perceived risks to investing and operating in the country, which have hurt efforts to attract foreign direct investment (FDI). Growth and competitiveness are also inhibited by inefficient trade facilitation policies, weak logistics services, and underdeveloped infrastructure. These constraints have made it difficult for Pakistan to fully exploit its proximity to China, a trade powerhouse, with which it has a free trade agreement. All in all, the anti-export bias of Pakistan’s trade policy has made it more difficult for outward-looking firms to grow by accessing global markets. A series of actions in the areas of trade policy, trade facilitation and connectivity, and institutional coordination could potentially stimulate Pakistan’s growth through increased trade and investment competitiveness. Integration with other countries in the region and neighboring regions, particularly East Asia, will allow Pakistan to diversify both its product basket and markets. Finally, full normalization of trade relations with India would allow Pakistan to benefit from India’s fast growth and promote complementarities, including valuechain activities and investment potential. -
Publication
Afghanistan Diagnostics Trade Integration Study
(Washington, DC, 2012-11)Trade enables countries to import ideas and technologies, realize comparative advantages and economies of scale, and foster competition and innovation, which in turn increases productivity and achieves higher sustainable employment and economic growth. Countries open to international trade tend to provide more opportunities to their people, and grow faster. Afghanistan could derive far more benefit from its international trade opportunities than it does at present. This Diagnostics Trade Integration Study (DTIS) report is intended to identify concrete policy actions in three areas of endeavor: lowering the transaction costs of trade, increasing Afghanistan's competitiveness in world markets, and providing an analytical foundation for Afghanistan's national trade strategy. The study examines how to do this, looking not only at trade performance and policy, but also at three sectors with great export potential: agriculture, gemstones and carpets, as well as the investment climate, customs as a driver of trade facilitation, and on promoting infrastructure services. All five chapters in this report provide a detailed and comprehensive analysis of trade issues intended to reduce the transaction costs of trade. Growth in Afghanistan has been strong and volatile because of its heavy reliance on agriculture. Now it faces a transition: prospects of a drawdown of international military forces and a decline in civilian aid by 2014. Security issues and political instability could undermine Afghanistan's Transition. Such threats could harm not only economic growth, but deterioration would repel private-sector investment. -
Publication
Pakistan: Export Diversification and Trade Policy
(Washington, DC, 2012-06-26)Pakistan’s trade indicators reflect low outward orientation, concentration on low value added activities and an undiversified product mix which out of line with the fastest growing areas of world demand. The export share of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has remained low and falling—fro -
Publication
Consolidating and Accelerating Exports in Bangladesh : A Policy Agenda
(Washington, DC, 2012-06)For Bangladesh to become a middle-income country, growth in exports needs to accelerate exports of basic garments will continue to be important in the near future, but Bangladesh's competitive advantage in this area could erode over time. As such, looking ahead, accelerating exports will require not only consolidating existing strengths in basic garments but diversifying gradually into other products such as higher value garment and service exports. Forward-looking policymaking requires that measures be put in place now to encourage such diversification in future, while building on existing strengths. How can Bangladesh make this happen? Available research shows that the infrastructure deficit, especially energy, as well as lack of appropriate skills and the weak regulatory environment continue to hinder exports from Bangladesh. These weaknesses still persist. To complement work done so far, this report focuses on the role of trade logistics, skills and compliance with labor standards in consolidating existing strengths and moving to higher value products, using the garment sector as a lens. In addition, given the growing importance of services in world trade, the report also examines prospects for diversifying into a 'reach sector' such as Information technology (IT)-enabled services that can provide high-quality jobs. This report supports the knowledge agenda of the World Bank, which goes hand in hand with its lending role. Indeed, such knowledge is critical for better and more effective lending approaches, and for supporting the Bank's policy dialogue with Government. The report forms part of the growth and trade work program being undertaken by Bangladesh's poverty reduction and economic management team. -
Publication
The Service Revolution in South Asia
(Washington, DC, 2009-06)The story of Hyderabad, the capital of the Indian state Andhra Pradesh, is truly inspiring for late-comers to development. Within two decades, Andhra Pradesh has been catapulted straight from a poor and largely agricultural economy into a major service center. It has transformed itself from a lagging into a leading region. Fuelled by an increase in service exports of 45 times between 1998 and 2008, the number of information technology companies in Hyderabad increased eight times, and employment increased 20 times. Service-led growth has mushroomed in other parts of India and South Asia as well. Indeed, growth in the services sector has enabled South Asia to grow almost as fast as East Asia in this century, with growth of just under seven percent annually between 2000 and 2007. Growth rates in South Asia and East Asia have converged. The two fastest growing regions in the world, however, have very different growth patterns. While East Asia is a story of growth led by manufacturing, South Asia has thrived on service-led growth. The promise of the services revolution is that countries do not need to wait to get started with rapid development. There is a new boat that development late-comers can take. The globalization of service exports provides alternative opportunities for developing countries to find niches, beyond manufacturing, where they can specialize, scale up and achieve explosive growth, just like the industrializes. The core of the argument is that as the number of goods and services produced and traded across the world expand with globalization, the possibilities for all countries to develop based on their comparative advantage expand. That comparative advantage can just as easily be in services as in manufacturing or indeed agriculture. -
Publication
Bangladesh : Improving Competitiveness through Trade Policy Reforms
(Washington, DC, 2007-05)In an increasingly competitive, globalizing world, Bangladesh needs to rationalize its tariff structure and lower overall protection so that its exports can compete in world markets. At the same time, the government needs to protect revenues in a fiscally-constrained year. This note proposes a package of tariff reforms that simplifies the rate structure, lowers average nominal protection, improves economic efficiency and is virtually revenue neutral. Adverse revenue impact, if there are any, could be addressed by strengthening the large taxpayers units, reducing the numerous exemptions in value-added tax (VAT), and expanding the tax base.