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Reaping the Benefits of Deeper Euro-Med Integration Through Trade Facilitation

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The current political turmoil in the Arab world has contributed to renewed interest in the Barcelona Process and how it can be improved in order to promote inclusive growth in the non-EU Mediterranean countries. In this paper, we explore whether deeper integration in the form of trade facilitation – i.e. improved and simplified trade procedures – could be an important part of a reform agenda. Adopting a Southern perspective by focusing on exports from non-EU Mediterranean countries to the EU, we use data from the World Bank’s Doing Business Database on the efficiency of trade procedures to formally test whether the efficiency of trade procedures affects (i) bilateral volumes of exports, and (ii) the number of products that are exported. We find that improving export and import procedures to the best practice levels (for each group of countries) is likely to increase the value of non-EU Mediterranean exports by 34% and to increase the number of products exported by non-EU Mediterranean countries by 21%. A main implication of the results is therefore that more efforts should to be devoted to trade facilitation in order to reap the benefits of deeper integration between the two groups of countries.

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  • Bourdet, Yves & Persson, Maria, 2011. "Reaping the Benefits of Deeper Euro-Med Integration Through Trade Facilitation," Working Papers 2011:15, Lund University, Department of Economics.
    • Handle: RePEc:hhs:lunewp:2011_015
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    Cited by:

    1. Persson, Maria, 2012. "From trade preferences to trade facilitation: Taking stock of the issues," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 6, pages 1-33.
    2. Mathilde Maurel & Hugo Lapeyronie & Bogdan Meunier, 2016. "Impact of hard and soft infrastructure: Evidence from the EU partners, North Africa and CEECs," Working Papers hal-01396058, HAL.
    3. (ed.), 0. "Research Handbook on Economic Diplomacy," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 16053.
    4. Jean-Pierre Chauffour & Bernard M., 2013. "Harnessing Trade Opportunities in the Middle East and North Africa," RSCAS Working Papers PP2013/07, European University Institute.
    5. Thorvaldur Gylfason & Inmaculada Martínez-Zarzoso & Per Magnus Wijkman, 2012. "How Free Trade Can Help Convert the 'Arab Spring' into Permanent Peace and Democracy," CESifo Working Paper Series 3882, CESifo.
    6. Thorvaldur Gylfason & Inmaculada Mart�nez-Zarzoso & Per Magnus Wijkman, 2015. "Can free trade help convert the 'Arab Spring' into permanent peace and democracy?," Defence and Peace Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 26(3), pages 247-270, June.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Barcelona Process; Mediterranean Union; European Union; Deeper Integration; Trade Facilitation; Export volumes; Export Diversification;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C23 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Models with Panel Data; Spatio-temporal Models
    • F15 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Economic Integration
    • O24 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Development Planning and Policy - - - Trade Policy; Factor Movement; Foreign Exchange Policy

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