• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.1-13
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• 2019

Purpose - This paper empirically investigates the competition effect of exports between Korea and China in their common-export markets considering market sophistication. Modern market sophistication includes an importing country's aggregate demand for products of high quality, design, novelty, eco-friendliness, and even IPR protection. Using an empirical analysis to identify the demand for product quality across countries, this paper estimates the effects of market sophistication on the competition between Korean exports and Chinese products. Design/Methodology - Our empirical model considers the relationship between an importing country's consumer sophistication and the export competition between Korea and China. This study employs the existing theoretical framework to identify the aggregate demand for product quality across countries. Using a quite direct measurement (the consumer sophistication index, our analysis investigates the differential effects of Korea's export market sophistication, particularly in markets where Korean exports are in competition with similar Chinese products. Findings - Our main findings can be summarized as follows: the negative effects of the export competition between Korea and China on Korea's exports are stronger in third markets where consumers are less sophisticated while the effects are not as pronounced in markets where consumers are more sophisticated. This result, however, best applies to differentiated goods which significantly vary in product quality. Originality/value - Existing studies focus on the supply side of production and make the assumption that the market preference for export quality is identical across countries. This paper attempts to evaluate the export competition between Korea and China from the demand-side perspective. This area of trade studies is underexplored both empirically and in theory, although the issue has long been important to Korean and world trade.

• East Asian Economic Review
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.81-100
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• 2013

This paper investigates the new link between the export-creating effects of Korea's tied aid and the export-diverting effects coming from China's export expansion, which have been rarely explored by the existing studies. A panel data consisting of 98-104 aid recipients of Korea through the period of 1995-2009 shows that the net export-creating effects are weaker at the export destinations where the export competition between Korea and China is fierce, while they are stronger at the export markets where it is not so severe. These findings applies to consumption goods rather than capital and intermediate goods.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.45-62
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• 2016

This paper analyzes changes in the export potential and competitiveness of China, Japan, and Korea. The analysis of Japan's export market share reveals that in sectors where Korea's potential was strong in the early 1990s, Japan's market share diminished. This suggests the possibility that Korea was catching up with Japan, eating into Japan's market share. The same analysis of Korea's export market share in the 2000s shows, for items in which China's export potential was high, Korea's market share has declined comparatively since 2010, with the tendency growing much larger. China's export potential continues to expand in markets for Korea's key export products, making it difficult to rule out the possibility that Korea's competitiveness in key export products will be hindered, driven by the catching up of China. To respond to these challenges, it is important for Korea continuously to foster and enhance creative and core capabilities that latecomers will not easily be able to emulate.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.1-16
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• 2019

Purpose - This research empirically proves that global shipbuilding industry leadership has moved to China from Korea. Design/Methodology - Competitiveness is measured by AHP for the weights of comprehensive competitiveness, which is the output mixture of three attributive factors: shipbuilding technology, shipbuilding contract price, and export credit. Findings - China is far ahead of Korea for standard vessels such as bulkers and containerships with competitiveness weights of 0.762 and 0.612, respectively, against 0.238 and 0.388 of Korea. Korea is maintaining its competitiveness only in LNG carriers (174k CBM) with a competitiveness weight 0.621. China and Korea have similar competitiveness for chemical carriers, complex vessels with a small hull size. The sources of Chinese competitiveness are shipbuilding contract price and export credit. With the majority share of standard vessel types in the world fleet, China will hold a bigger market share than Korea in the global shipbuilding industry in the forthcoming years. Implications - The swing factors of market power are shipbuilding technology and contract price. If China fails to further develop shipbuilding technology for shipowners worried about the reliability of the Chinese-built vessels, shipowners may swing back to Korea. The rising Chinese labor cost will expedite this swing in the forthcoming competition. Originality/value - To the best of the author's knowledge, this is the first paper that quantitatively examines the competitiveness of shipbuilding between China and Korea by comparing attributive factors for competitiveness.

• The Journal of Fisheries Business Administration
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• v.34 no.2
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• pp.141-164
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• 2003

This study analysis the market status and competitive structure of Korean fishery in Japan import market, and derive policy implications for seeking main causes. Specifically', trade state between Korea and Japan is discovered and theoretical model is also used to analysis competitiveness between two countries. And then real measuring methods of competitive index is Introduced, the status of Korean fishery products in Japan import market is analysed totally through the study of comparative predominance and export competition. The analysis is based on the statistical methods such as RCA, RMI, and CMS. In summary, first, Korean fishery products have the comparative predominance in Japan, China and Thailand, but they have the comparative inferiority in USA, considering research results. Second, competitiveness of fishery products between Korea and in Japan import market extreme, relatively, competitiveness of Korean fishery products for Thailand's fishery products is lowest. Third, Korean fishery products maintain unconstant pattern, but competitive inputs result in increasing export to Japan generally.

• Journal of Korea Port Economic Association
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.155-183
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• 2011

The purpose of this paper is to analyze competition status of Korean and Chinese vessels in the EU market. To achieve this purpose, this study uses Market Share Index, Export Bias Index, Trade Specialization Index, Export Similarity Index, and Market Share Expansion Ratio-Export Similarity Deepening Ratio as analyzing method. The statistical data used in this study are obtained from the trade statistics for 5 years(2005-2009) produced by Korean International Trade Association. The results of this study show that Korean ships are less competitive than Chinese ones in the EU export market in that Korea does not export various kinds of ships but export some restricted kinds of vessels even in the competitive ship, implying that Korea has been gradually losing its competitiveness. These results suggest that Korea should improve the competitiveness of shipbuilding industry by pursuing such differentiated strategies as exporting high value-added vessels while keeping on maintaining Korea's dominance over its competitive ships to overcome China's competitive advantage in the EU region.

• Korean Journal of Construction Engineering and Management
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.16-23
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• 2022

This study examined the trend of international competitiveness over the past 10 years (2011-2020), focusing on comparative analysis with China and the United States, targeting seven major export items of Korean construction machinery based on 6 units of HS code. To this end, the export similarity index and trade competitiveness index were calculated and analyzed using UN Comtrade and Korea International Trade Association trade statistics. As a result of the analysis, competition between Korea and China has intensified over the past decade, and competition with the United States has remained at a certain level. Korean forklifts (8427.20) are exporting to the world with strong competitiveness in the global market. Excavators (8429.52) and loaders (8429.51), which have the largest export share of Korean construction machinery, have a weight advantage, but they are exporting due to price inferiority. The rest of the items were found to be inferior in price and weight, and were not competitive in the global market. These analysis results suggest the following implications. First, it is necessary to strengthen efforts to expand exports of universal construction machinery items, which are expected to increase in demand in the future, by boosting the economy and expanding infrastructure investment in accordance with eco-friendly policies. Second, excavators, which have been shown to have a quality advantage and a price competitive advantage, need to further strengthen export marketing activities not only in China and the United States but also in emerging developing countries.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.37-59
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• 2021

Purpose - Although models of innovation and exporting dominate recent studies of relations between innovation and access to foreign markets, relations between innovation and foreign direct investment (FDI) are less explored. This is especially true of relations between types of innovation and FDI. We fill that gap in the literature with empirical evidence that clarifies whether firms enter foreign markets through exports or FDI. Design/methodology - In order to assess the role of innovation in firms' international engagement strategies, we develop research hypotheses and present new empirical evidence on firms' choice of entry - exports and FDI - based on firm-level data. Findings - Our empirical results suggest that the impact of product innovation is more significant in transition from being a purely domestic firm to an exporter, while process innovation more significantly affect transition from being an exporter to a multinational enterprise. Our results also support 'self-selection into FDI' rather than 'learning-by-performing FDI' in the relationship between innovation and firms' overseas expansion. Originality/value - Recent literature on the relationship between innovation and firms' participation in foreign markets is dominated by models of innovation and export behavior. However, foreign direct investment by multinational enterprises may also be associated with firms' innovative activities. We first analyze how product and process innovations influence firms' choices to initiate exports or FDI.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.235-253
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• 2010

The export is an important economic growth strategy in South Korea. South Korea is strongly dependant on external trades. Bilateral trade between China and South Korea has been grown rapidly in recent years. The China is now Korea's first-largest trading partner. Thus, the Korea-China Free Trade Agrement (FTA) in South Korea's trade operations is very important. A discussion of Korea-China bilateral FTA commenced in 2004 November. This paper is to recognize the phenomenon of major issued fields in the Korea-China FTA such as a manufacturing, agriculture, customs and seek a negotiation strategy that are summarized as follows. In terms of trade based on manufacturing, it is necessary to divide into a private, general reduction and priority reduction item to recognize whether it is complementary or competitive on the specific industry in the FTA negotiation by using an index regarding supplement and competition of these two countries. In particularly sensitive agricultural field, FTA should be progressed gradually after giving a certain period of time of grace period on the basis of various flexible tariff systems in order to minimize agriculture damage as a result of the rapid growth from import of Chinese agricultural goods.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.249-280
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• 2004

This paper analyzes the industrial growth of Korea in the 1990s and its relationship with the nation's export performance. The result shows that total factor productivity (TFP) played a significant role in the growth of some industries, where in particular a sharp increase in TFP was observed in the electrics and electronics industry and the automobile industry in the late 1990s. While CEPII RCA indexes for the Korean industries such as IT industry and automobile industry significantly increased since 1998, only limited evidence was found that TFP or TFI influenced RCA. Investigating Korea's export performance in the Northeast Asian context, this paper shows that, in the 1990s, the growth of Korea's exports to Japan was led by industries that recorded relatively fast growth in total factor input (TFI). In contrast, that to China was almost equally contributed by industries that experienced relatively fast growth in TFP or TFI. This paper also investigates competition between Korea and China, and Korea and Japan in the world market. The competition between Korea and China was relatively stronger for the Korean industries to whose growth TFI made a more significant contribution. While no decisive evidence is found for the relationship between TFP growth in Korean industries and their competition against Japan in the world market, it is revealed that the competition between Korea and Japan became less intense for the Korean industries to whose growth TFI made a stronger contribution. In this regard, the paper supports the view of 'nut-cracking' that the Korean economy has lost its competitiveness in the sectors where it maintained comparative advantage, but failed to catch up more advanced countries such as Japan by gaining competitiveness in more capital or technology intensive sectors.