Dynamics of comparative advantage in export of India’s agriculture

This paper analyses the dynamics of comparative advantage in India’s agricultural exports over the period 2001 to 2019. In order to analyze the pattern of export specialization, we use the revealed comparative advantage index, and its variant, the revealed symmetric comparative advantage index. We use the Markov transition matrix to examine the product mobility of comparative advantage. Our results show that the extent of agricultural trade openness has remained constant over time and that there has been little change in the composition of agricultural exports. Between 2017 and 2019, two products—semi- or wholly milled rice, and frozen shrimps and prawns—accounted for one-third of all exports. Analysis of the mobility of comparative advantage reveals little mobility of products from the lowest to the highest decile. There is a 65.8 percent probability that a product will stay in the first decile even after nearly two decades. A high degree of persistence of export specialization implies a much greater probability of starting and ending up in the highest decile. Policy should aim at diversification of the agricultural export basket through a product-specific focus that is based on export demand and the exploration of new markets.