IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/wbk/prmecp/ep127.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Can Tourism Encourage Better Export Performance and Diversification in Nepal?

Author

Listed:
  • Reis, José Guilherme

    (World Bank)

  • Varela, Gonzalo

    (World Bank)

Abstract

Entering and successfully surviving in export markets is a costly process for firms. Key steps for success include learning about the existence of foreign demand, determining the production costs of exportable goods, building a high-quality reputation, succeeding in product branding to reduce competitive pressures, constant upgrading of quality standards to better serve demanding international clients, and remaining competitive with other players in the global marketplace. Drawing on the findings of recent research (Reis and Varela 2013), this note argues that tourism can help alleviate some of these costs by providing a relatively inexpensive platform for cost discovery and acting as a low-cost in-house trade fair, accessible to all domestic producers. Combining product-level data on the world’s and Nepal’s exports (for goods that are both related and unrelated to tourism) with Nepalese data on tourist inflows and expenditures and macro indicators on relative prices results in a positive association between tourist inflows from given destinations and their expenditures with future merchandise exports of tourist-related products to those destinations. For goods previously unrelated to tourism, data reveal no connection between tourism flows and their future exports. The spillovers from tourism into merchandise export performance and diversification imply that there are gains to be had from cooperation between tourism and export promotion activities.

Suggested Citation

  • Reis, José Guilherme & Varela, Gonzalo, 2013. "Can Tourism Encourage Better Export Performance and Diversification in Nepal?," World Bank - Economic Premise, The World Bank, issue 127, pages 1-6, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:wbk:prmecp:ep127
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTPREMNET/Resources/EP127.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Rauch, J E & Watson, Joel, 2001. "Entrepreneurship in International Trade," University of California at San Diego, Economics Working Paper Series qt1qx2x540, Department of Economics, UC San Diego.
    2. Iza Lejárraga & Peter Walkenhorst, 2013. "Economic policy, tourism trade and productive diversification," International Economics, CEPII research center, issue 135-136, pages 1-12.
    3. Jose Guilherme Reis & Gonzalo Varela, 2015. "Travel Channel Meets Discovery Channel or How Tourism Can Encourage Better Export Performance and Diversification in Nepal," South Asia Economic Journal, Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka, vol. 16(2), pages 183-208, September.
    4. Hausmann, Ricardo & Rodrik, Dani, 2003. "Economic development as self-discovery," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(2), pages 603-633, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Laura Gomez Mera, 2016. "From Evidence to Policy Supporting Nepal’s Trade Integration Strategy," World Bank Publications - Reports 24933, The World Bank Group.
    2. Honeck, Dale & Akhtar, Md. Shoaib, 2014. "Achieving Bangladesh's tourism potential: Linkages to export diversification, employment generation and the "green economy"," WTO Staff Working Papers ERSD-2014-15, World Trade Organization (WTO), Economic Research and Statistics Division.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jose Guilherme Reis & Gonzalo Varela, 2015. "Travel Channel Meets Discovery Channel or How Tourism Can Encourage Better Export Performance and Diversification in Nepal," South Asia Economic Journal, Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka, vol. 16(2), pages 183-208, September.
    2. Bouraima Sawadogo & Constant Fouopi Djiogap & Idrissa Ouedraogo & Moukaila Mouzamilou Takpara, 2024. "An empirical assessment of the role of trade in services in export product diversification in Sub-Saharan Africa," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 61(3), pages 229-257, June.
    3. Jeffrey Frankel, 2014. "Mauritius: African Success Story," NBER Chapters, in: African Successes, Volume IV: Sustainable Growth, pages 295-342, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Mikhail Y. Afanasyev & Alexander V. Kudrov, 2021. "Economic Complexity, Embedding Degree and Adjacent Diversity of the Regional Economies," Montenegrin Journal of Economics, Economic Laboratory for Transition Research (ELIT), vol. 17(2), pages 7-22.
    5. Jarreau, Joachim & Poncet, Sandra, 2012. "Export sophistication and economic growth: Evidence from China," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(2), pages 281-292.
    6. Robert Z. Lawrence & Lawrence Edward, 2010. "Do Developed and Developing Countries Compete Head to Head in High Tech?," Working Paper Series WP10-8, Peterson Institute for International Economics.
    7. Oznur Ozdamar & Eleftherios Giovanis & Sahizer Samuk, 2020. "State business relations and the dynamics of job flows in Egypt and Turkey," Eurasian Business Review, Springer;Eurasia Business and Economics Society, vol. 10(4), pages 519-558, December.
    8. Malgorzata Gorzalczynska-Koczkodaj, 2023. "Intelligent Specializations as an Opportunity for Regional Development on the Example of the West Pomeranian Voivodeship," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(4), pages 446-455.
    9. Tilman Altenburg, 2011. "Can Industrial Policy Work under Neopatrimonial Rule?," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2011-041, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    10. Raquel Ortega-Argilés, 2022. "The evolution of regional entrepreneurship policies: “no one size fits all”," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 69(3), pages 585-610, December.
    11. Andre Nassif & Carmem Aparecida Feijo & Eliane Araújo, 2016. "Structural change, catching up and falling behind in the BRICS: A comparative analysis based on trade pattern and Thirlwall’s Law," PSL Quarterly Review, Economia civile, vol. 69(279), pages 373-421.
    12. Giovanni Dosi & Andrea Roventini & Emmanuele Russo, 2020. "Public Policies And The Art Of Catching Up," Working Papers hal-03242369, HAL.
    13. Philippe Aghion & Jing Cai & Mathias Dewatripont & Luosha Du & Ann Harrison & Patrick Legros, 2022. "Industrial Policy and Competition," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Globalization, Firms, and Workers, chapter 15, pages 349-380, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    14. Collier, Paul, 2013. "Aid as a Catalyst for Pioneer Investment," WIDER Working Paper Series 004, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    15. Peter J. Montiel & Luis Servén, 2008. "Real Exchange Rates, Saving and Growth: Is there a Link?," Department of Economics Working Papers 2010-18, Department of Economics, Williams College.
    16. Elvira Uyarra & Jens Sörvik & Inger Midtkandal, 2014. "Inter-regional Collaboration in Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialisation (RIS3). S3 Working Paper Series no 6/2014," JRC Research Reports JRC91963, Joint Research Centre.
    17. Andrés Rodríguez-Clare, 2005. "Coordination Failure, Clusters, and Microeconomic Interventions," Economía Journal, The Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association - LACEA, vol. 0(Fall 2005), pages 1-41, August.
    18. Jie Bai, 2016. "Melons as Lemons: Asymmetric Information, Consumer Learning and Seller Reputation," Natural Field Experiments 00540, The Field Experiments Website.
    19. Wim Naudé, 2007. "Peace, Prosperity, and Pro-Growth Entrepreneurship," WIDER Working Paper Series DP2007-02, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    20. Sampson, Thomas, 2013. "Brain drain or brain gain? Technology diffusion and learning on-the-job," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(1), pages 162-176.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • F1 - International Economics - - Trade

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:wbk:prmecp:ep127. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Michael Jelenic (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/prewbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.