Kranti Mulik

Geographical Indications and The Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights Agreement (TRIPS): A Case Study of Basmati Rice Exports

The controversy over the granting of patenting rights to three new strains of Basmati rice by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is used as a case study to analyze the impact of incomplete protection of intellectual property. Results suggest that the introduction of a competing product that may infringe on India’s geographical indicator has lowered the product differentiation of Indian Basmati rice in key export markets.

Exchange Rate Dynamics and the Bilateral Trade Balance: The Case of U.S. Agriculture

This study examines the dynamic effects of changes in exchange rates on bilateral trade of agricultural products between the United States and its 15 major trading partners. Special attention is paid to investigate whether or not the J-curve hypothesis holds for U.S. agricultural trade. For this purpose, an autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach to cointegration is applied to quarterly time-series data from 1989 and 2007. Results show that the exchange rate plays a crucial role in determining the short- and long-run behavior of U.S. agricultural trade. However, we find little evidence of the J-curve phenomenon for U.S. agricultural products with the United States’ major trading partners.