Yongzheng Yang

China's Integration into the World Economy: Implications for Developing Countries

With Chinas accession to the World Trade Organization in late 2001, many of its trading partners have become concerned that the resulting increased competition in the worlds goods and capital markets will adversely affect their own growth prospects. This paper argues that Chinas closer integration into the world economy will impose adjustment costs on its trading partners in the short to medium term, but that the benefits it generates are likely to dominate in the long run.

Trade with Asia and skill upgrading: Effects on labor markets in the older industrial countries

Trade with Asia and Skill Upgrading: Effects on Factor Markets in the Older Industrial Countries. — The trade and labor nexus is examined with a model incorporating refinements which weaken the H-O-S result that free trade can cause factor rewards to equalize. Asian growth and rising openness in the period 1970–1992, taken in isolation, are found to cause real wages to rise there, even for production workers. Although they also cause increased wage dispersion, the magnitude is small compared with the effects of skill upgrading. Projections to 2010, which combine further expansion in imports from Asia with continued Northern skill upgrading, yield declining real wages and/or unemployment for both production and farm workers. Restricting imports from Asia is found to be an ineffective response.ZusammenfassungHandel mit Asien und Höherqualifizierung. Auswirkun-gen auf die Faktormärkte in den älteren Industrieländern. — Das verwendete Modell enthält einige Verfeinerungen, die die Implikationen des H-O-S-Modells abschwächen, wonach Freihandel dazu führt, daß sich die Faktorentlohnungen der einzelnen Länder angleichen. Wenn man das Wachstum in Asien und die zunehmende Offenheit in der Zeit von 1970–1992 isoliert betrachtet, dann stellt sich heraus, daß dies den Ländern auf der nördlichen Halbkugel Nettovorteile gebracht hat. Dort stiegen die Reallöhne sogar für Industriearbeiter. Projektionen für das Jahr 2010, die einen weiteren Anstieg der Importe aus Asien mit fortgesetzter Höherqualifizierung der Arbeitskräfte im Norden kombinieren, ergeben sinkende Reallöhne und/oder Arbeitslosigkeit für Arbeiter sowohl in der Industrie als auch in der Landwirtschaft. Importbeschränkungen gegenüber Asien erweisen sich als ungeeignet.

The economic costs of food self-sufficiency in China

Abstract Despite the surge in agricultural output since the late 1970s, a comparison of Chinas resource endowments with those of its trading partners suggests that, with continued rapid income growth, food imports will again expand unless relative domestic prices are raised. Quantitative analysis of price policies which would achieve self-sufficiency in the 1990s indicates net economic costs ranging between 2–3% of GNP annually. These results are, however, particularly sensitive to the relatively undocumented changes taking place in the dependence of Chinas rapidly growing livestock sector on feed grains.

How Should China Feed Itself

Since the publication of Brown’s book, enormous interest in the issue has been generated among policymakers and scholars around the world. This surge in interest coincided with the sharp rises in world food prices in the year to June 1996 following on from harvest shortfalls in several grain-producing regions around the world. With the slowing of grain output growth since the mid-1980s, Chinese policymakers have been particularly concerned about food security. Brown’s dire prediction has aggravated their concern.

China's agriculture at the crossroads.

Preface - Acknowledgements - List of Figures and Tables - Abbreviations and Glossary - Notes on the Contributors - Agricultural Reform: An Unfinished Long March Yongzheng Yang & Weiming Tian - PART I: SETTING THE SCENE - Issues and Challenges in Agricultural Reform Li Ding - A Changing Global Food Market: Implications for China Ron Duncan - PART II: COMMODITY MARKETS - An Analysis of Chinas Corn Market Xiangyong Tan & Xian Xin - The Changing Pattern of Rice Production in China Weiming Tian - Livestock Consumptions Xiurong He & Weiming Tian - Feeding the Livestock Fu Qin & Weiming Tian - On-Farm Grain Stocks in China and their Impact on Market Stability Bingsheng Ke - PART III: PRODUCTION EFFICIENCY, STATISTICS AND MARKET PROJECTIONS - Technical Efficiency of Chinas Grain Production Weiming Tian - Land Fragmentation and Scales Economies in Rural China Guanghua Wan & Enjiang Cheng - The Accuracy of Chinas Grain Production Data Ziping Wu & Zhifang Wang - A Projection of Chinas Grain Demand and Supply: 1980-2010 Xiji An - Impact of Chinas Growth on Global Grain Markets George Reeves & David Vincent - PART IV: TRADE POLICY - Domestic Resource Cost of Chinas Agricultural Sectors Xiaoguang Zhang - Analysis of Chinese and Indonesian Food Policy Options Ray Trewin - Food Security, Farm Income and Trade Policy in China Yongzheng Yang & Yiping Huang - Index

The Asian Crisis and Economic Change in China

During the Asian crisis, China’s healthy reserves and low debt helped avoid a “country run”, yet China did experience an apparently autonomous rise in private savings, a rise in capital outflow and a slowdown in growth. We employ global general equilibrium analysis to examine the relative contributions of external and internal shocks in China during the crisis. The savings rise appears to have been dominant domestically and, by coincidence, was a significant contributor to the international effects of the crisis. The successful defence of fixed US

Pacific Island Countries

parity, however, made the combined shocks more contractionary than if the exchange rate regime had been more flexible. JEL Classification Numbers: C68, E65, F41, O11.

Pacific Island Countries: In Search of a Trade Strategy

People living in Pacific Island Countries (PICs) are vulnerable to a wide range of natural hazards, including floods, droughts, cyclones/typhoons, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, king tides and tsunamis. The impact of these occurrences on small countries with dispersed populations can quickly overrun local coping capacity. Climate change is exacerbating the risks associated with many of these hazards. On 13 March 2015, Vanuatu was struck by category 5 Cyclone Pam. An estimated 166,600 people (more than half the population) required urgent humanitarian assistance. People in the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Kiribati also experienced damage as a result of sea surges, flooding, rain and winds. In addition, from March through May 2015, the Federated States of Micronesia were hit by three super typhoons (Maysak, Noul and Dolphin) which cumulatively have affected more than 25,000 people. The current 2015-2016 El Niño event is forecast to be the worst since 1997-1998 and perhaps the most catastrophic ever experienced by the PICs, bringing both drought and larger, more frequent storms. As of mid-2015, there have been seven typhoons (northern Pacific) and six cyclones (southern Pacific). The socio-economic impacts of drought, which has already been declared in areas of Fiji, Tonga and Vanuatu, combined with the increased likelihood of severe cyclones, require significant Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) actions to be immediately implemented.

The Real Exchange Rate; Assessment and Trade Impact in the Context of Fiji and Samoa

International trade is vital for economic prosperity in Pacific island countries, but their trade performance has been weak over the past decade with the exception of resource-rich countries. Small country size and remoteness from global economic centers may have contributed to this relatively poor performance. However, the emergence of Asia as a global economic center presents Pacific island countries with an unprecedented opportunity to develop trade with Asia, particularly in tourism for a number of PICs. Moreover, if a strong two-way linkage is established between tourism and agriculture, Pacific island countries stands a better chance to improve broad-based growth.

Agricultural Trade Reform after the Asian Recession: A Bridge Too Far?

This paper provides an assessment of real exchange rate measures and their impact on trade performance with special reference to two Pacific island countries, Fiji and Samoa. The analysis shows that the commonly used CPI-based real effective exchange rate (REER) measure provides a useful starting point of assessment, but alternative measures based on other price and cost indices should be used to check the robustness of the results, particularly given the large impact of global commodity prices on small open economies. The paper also offers some illustrations of how to quantify the impact of exchange rate movements on trade, especially in the face of data constraints in small open economies.