The Information Technology Agreement (ITA), a pluri-lateral trade agreement, seeks to accelerate and deepen the reduction of trade barriers for the critically important information and communication technology (ICT) industry. ITA thus provides an interesting case study of how tariff reduction...

For decades, Myanmar's economic system has been characterized by economic isolation and central planning. Today, however, as Myanmar is in the middle of a far-reaching political and economic transition, it is leaving this past behind. For Myanmar's enterprises, and Small and Medium Sizes...

This paper examines how geography matters for the location of industries in East Asia, employing regression analyses on a novel and comprehensive regional GDP dataset. This study examines how geography affects industrial location patterns, particularly the role of infrastructure, such as ports...

This paper focuses on the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-a major final assembler in production-where studies and evidence on the role of the region in global value chains are limited. We seek to provide new evidence regarding the extent and patterns of international fragmentation...

At a time when regional production networks have been resurgent, especially in Asia, why has India's integration in regional markets had not been deeper? Using highly disaggregated trade data and an analysis of industry perspectives based on semi-structured interviews with a sample of firms and...

What is the relationship between foreign manufacturing multinational corporations (MNCs) and the expansion of indigenous technological and managerial technological capabilities among Chinese firms? China has been remarkably successful in designing industrial policies, joint venture requirements,...

This paper employs a modern global value chain (GVC) decomposition framework to quantify economic interdependence among Asian economies and between Asia and the rest of the world. It pays special attention to the value-added relationships among three sets of economies: those belonging to both...

This paper illustrates the upgrading experiences of the automotive and hard disk drive (HDD) industries in Thailand, chosen because of their outstanding export performance in the developing world. An understanding of their upgrading experiences can shed some light on the ongoing debate regarding...