Export Performance of South and East Asia in Modern Services

Advancements in information and communications technologies (ICTs) have increased the possibilities for trade in modern services and many Asian emerging and developed economies are participating increasingly in these new trade activities. This paper examines the export performance of these emerging and developed Asian economies in selected modern services: computer and information services, business and professional services, and telecommunications services, using a stochastic frontier gravity type model. Estimation results show that performance of emerging economies in South Asia and the ASEAN region, in terms of realization of export potential, is considerably lower than that of the developed world in North America and Europe. The results also show that the number of graduates and the ICT infrastructure in emerging countries are amongst key factors for modern services exports. These findings suggest that emerging economies need to remove ‘behind the border' constraints and adopt advanced technologies in order to catch up with the high performing developed countries.