Bulent Esiyok

A SPATIAL REGRESSION APPROACH TO FDI IN VIETNAM: PROVINCE-LEVEL EVIDENCE

Foreign direct investment (FDI) flows into Vietnam have increased significantly in recent years and are distributed unequally between provinces. This paper aims to investigate the locational determinants of FDI in 62 Vietnamese provinces and whether spatial dependence is a significant factor that both researchers and policy-makers should take into account. We report that province-specific per-capita income, secondary education enrolment, labor costs, openness to trade, and domestic investment affect FDI directly within the province itself and have indirect effects on FDI in neighboring provinces. The direct and indirect effects coexist with spill-over effects and spatial dependence between provinces. Our findings indicate that FDI in Vietnam reflects a combination of complex vertical and export platform motivations on the part of foreign investors; and an agglomeration dynamics that may perpetuate the existing regional disparities in the distribution of FDI capital between provinces.

Motivations and destination selection of mature international thalassotherapy tourists

Because of population ageing worldwide, awareness of the motives of mature tourists is more important than ever. Previous studies show that, among others, income level, distance and education influence the decisions of tourists when choosing a travel destination. However, studies on health tourism suggest that these general conclusions may mask differences across different age groups. For instance, older people place greater reliance on their savings than their current income for tourism expenditure. We take this line of research and examine destination selection of mature international thalassotherapy tourists in conjunction with their motivations (as a subdivision of thermal tourism) across two age groups: 54 years and under and 55 years and over. We conduct a panel data analysis on 78 countries from which tourists in Turkey received thalassotherapy from 2012 to 2014. We find that the 55 years and over age group is less sensitive to income levels but more sensitive to distance and education than the other age group.

Heterogeneity in the determinants of length of stay across middle age and senior age groups in thermal tourism

ABSTRACT Water has been seen as a healing source of life for centuries. Even the placebo effect of thermal therapies increases consumers’ well-being. Especially with easy traveling options demand for thermal therapies are on the rise. Users of thermal therapies are mostly composed of seniors. Even though age groups in the senior market have heterogeneous needs, managers assume them to be homogenous. Measuring thermal tourism demand by the length of stay, this study analyzed the determinants affecting the length of stay of older thermal tourists. The length of stay is predicted to have been affected by age, purchasing power, physical distance, and seasonal preferences. Even though all of the above have an effect on the length of stay, we find that age is the main determinant deciding the duration. These results may serve as a starting point for policymakers and tourism managers to tailor strategies to increase income streams associated with length of stay.

Spatial dependence in the growth process and implications for convergence rate: evidence on Vietnamese provinces

ABSTRACT Existent studies on Vietnamese provinces tend to assume that province-specific growth is independent of that in its neighbours. However, many studies analysing regional economic growth in China, Brazil and Mexico report the existence of spatial spill-over effects. This paper investigates whether this is the case for 60 Vietnamese provinces for the time-period 1999–2010, using a system-GMM estimator and a Solow growth model augmented with human and physical capital and spatial-lag covariates. We report that spatial dependence is a significant determinant of growth and conditional convergence in Vietnamese provinces. We also demonstrate that the rate of convergence decreases as the distance between neighbouring provinces increases. Given these findings, we recommend testing for spatial dependence in growth models for Vietnam and beyond to avoid omitted variable bias and inform evidence-based regional policies that take account of spatial externalities.