IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/eti/dpaper/17114.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Wholesalers, Indirect Exports, Geography, and Economies of Scope: Evidence from firm transaction data in Japan

Author

Listed:
  • ITO Tadashi
  • NAKAMURA Ryohei
  • MORITA Manabu

Abstract

This study examines wholesalers' roles in manufacturers' exports in Japan. First, it is shown that, as in the case of the manufacturing sector, productivity sorting on overseas activities is also present in the case of wholesalers. Namely, only the most productive wholesaler firms can engage in foreign direct investment, and the next productive ones can participate in export activities, while the least productive ones conduct domestic transactions only. Second, we investigate how wholesalers facilitate manufacturers' export activities in the form of indirect exports. We have found that wholesalers through which manufacturing firms indirectly export their goods are predominantly located in Tokyo or Osaka. The probability of indirect exports is negatively correlated with distance between manufacturers and wholesalers, but there are certain threshold distances at 300 to 500 kilometers, over which the chance of indirect exports turns null. Another notable finding is that wholesalers' productivities have positive correlation with the chance of indirect exports whereas manufacturers' productivities do not matter. The number of manufacturers from which a wholesaler purchases goods is found to have a positive correlation with the probability of indirect exports, which is a type of economies of scope effect.

Suggested Citation

  • ITO Tadashi & NAKAMURA Ryohei & MORITA Manabu, 2017. "Wholesalers, Indirect Exports, Geography, and Economies of Scope: Evidence from firm transaction data in Japan," Discussion papers 17114, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    • Handle: RePEc:eti:dpaper:17114
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.rieti.go.jp/jp/publications/dp/17e114.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01510997 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Elhanan Helpman & Marc J. Melitz & Stephen R. Yeaple, 2004. "Export Versus FDI with Heterogeneous Firms," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(1), pages 300-316, March.
    3. Crozet, Matthieu & Lalanne, Guy & Poncet, Sandra, 2013. "Wholesalers in international trade," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 1-17.
    4. OKUBO Toshihiro & TOMIURA Eiichi, 2013. "Regional Variations in Productivity Premium of Exporters: Evidence from plant-level data," Discussion papers 13005, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    5. TANAKA Ayumu, 2013. "Firm Productivity and Exports in the Wholesale Sector: Evidence from Japan," Discussion papers 13007, Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI).
    6. Baldwin, Richard, 1988. "Hyteresis in Import Prices: The Beachhead Effect," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(4), pages 773-785, September.
    7. Fujii, Daisuke & Ono, Yukako & Saito, Yukiko Umeno, 2017. "Indirect exports and wholesalers: Evidence from interfirm transaction network data," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 35-47.
    8. Ahn, JaeBin & Khandelwal, Amit K. & Wei, Shang-Jin, 2011. "The role of intermediaries in facilitating trade," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 73-85, May.
    9. Amil Petrin & Brian P. Poi & James Levinsohn, 2004. "Production function estimation in Stata using inputs to control for unobservables," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 4(2), pages 113-123, June.
    10. Marc J. Melitz, 2003. "The Impact of Trade on Intra-Industry Reallocations and Aggregate Industry Productivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 71(6), pages 1695-1725, November.
    11. James Levinsohn & Amil Petrin, 2003. "Estimating Production Functions Using Inputs to Control for Unobservables," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 70(2), pages 317-341.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Ito, Tadashi & Nakamura, Ryohei & Morita, Manabu, 2021. "Wholesalers, indirect exports, geography, and economies of scope: Evidence from firm transaction data in Japan," Japan and the World Economy, Elsevier, vol. 58(C).
    2. Daunfeldt, Sven-Olov & Engberg, Erik & Halvarsson, Daniel & Kokko, Ari & Tingvall, Patrik, 2019. "Wholesale firms: A catalyst for Swedish exports?," Ratio Working Papers 328, The Ratio Institute.
    3. Tadashi Ito & Yukiko Umeno Saito, 2021. "Indirect trade and direct trade: Evidence from Japanese firm transaction data," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 44(2), pages 444-461, February.
    4. Matthew A. Cole & Robert J. R. Elliott & Supreeya Virakul, 2010. "Firm Heterogeneity, Origin of Ownership and Export Participation," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 33(2), pages 264-291, February.
    5. Kiyoyasu Tanaka, 2015. "Firm Heterogeneity and FDI in Distribution Services," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 38(8), pages 1295-1311, August.
    6. Tsuyoshi Toshimitsu, 2019. "Trade Intermediaries, the Choice of Export Mode, and the “Learning-By-Exporting” Hypothesis," Discussion Paper Series 190, School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University.
    7. Ma, Yue & Tang, Heiwai & Zhang, Yifan, 2014. "Factor Intensity, product switching, and productivity: Evidence from Chinese exporters," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(2), pages 349-362.
    8. Ito, Banri & Xu, Zhaoyuan & Yashiro, Naomitsu, 2015. "Does agglomeration promote internationalization of Chinese firms?," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 34(C), pages 109-121.
    9. Muhammed BENLI, 2016. "FDI and export spillovers using Heckman’s two step approach: Evidence from Turkish manufacturing data," Theoretical and Applied Economics, Asociatia Generala a Economistilor din Romania - AGER, vol. 0(4(609), W), pages 315-342, Winter.
    10. Gábor Békés & Balázs Muraközy, 2018. "The ladder of internationalization modes: evidence from European firms," Review of World Economics (Weltwirtschaftliches Archiv), Springer;Institut für Weltwirtschaft (Kiel Institute for the World Economy), vol. 154(3), pages 455-491, August.
    11. Curzi, Daniele & Olper, Alessandro, 2012. "Export behavior of Italian food firms: Does product quality matter?," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 493-503.
    12. Buch, Claudia M. & Koch, Cathérine Tahmee & Koetter, Michael, 2009. "Margins of international banking: is there a productivity pecking order in banking, too?," Discussion Paper Series 2: Banking and Financial Studies 2009,12, Deutsche Bundesbank.
    13. Victoria Purice, 2011. "Exports and Firm Productivity. The effect of US steel safeguards," Bruges European Economic Research Papers 19, European Economic Studies Department, College of Europe.
    14. Giulio Cainelli & Eleonora Di Maria & Roberto Ganau, 2011. "Agglomeration, related-variety and internationalisation. Does a relationship exist?," Openloc Working Papers 1114, Public policies and local development.
    15. Nucci, Francesco & Pietrovito, Filomena & Pozzolo, Alberto Franco, 2023. "Intermediated trade and credit constraints: The case of firm’s imports," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 175(C), pages 201-220.
    16. William Connell & Emmanuel Dhyne & Hylke Vandenbussche, 2019. "Learning about demand abroad from wholesalers: a B2B analysis," Working Papers of Department of Economics, Leuven 643224, KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), Department of Economics, Leuven.
    17. Yu Gao & Yin He & Xiaopeng Yin, 2017. "Fixed Export Costs and Trade Patterns: The Case of China," The World Economy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(8), pages 1614-1623, August.
    18. Melitz, Marc J. & Redding, Stephen J., 2014. "Heterogeneous Firms and Trade," Handbook of International Economics, in: Gopinath, G. & Helpman, . & Rogoff, K. (ed.), Handbook of International Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 0, pages 1-54, Elsevier.
    19. Toshihiro Okubo & Eiichi Tomiura, 2019. "Regional variations in exporters’ productivity premium: Theory and evidence," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 803-821, August.
    20. Krüger, Jens, 2009. "How do firms organize trade?: Evidence from Ghana," Kiel Advanced Studies Working Papers 449, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:eti:dpaper:17114. 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: TANIMOTO, Toko (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/rietijp.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.