• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.304-316
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• 2020

Laos is rich in natural resources but lacks the capital to develop them. Partly alleviating the shortage is FDI from neighboring countries, especially Thailand. Not only does this contribute to directly increasing GDP by increasing effective demand, it also has an additional GDP increase effect by expanding Laos' production capacity. Laos' exports mostly consist of mineral resources and electricity. This, too, contributes to an increase in GDP by increasing the effective demand. Thailand accounts for more than 40 percent of Laos' exports. This paper tries to confirm the economic impact on Laos in Thailand through a econometric analysis of Laos' GDP, Laos' exports to Thailand and Thailand's FDI to Laos. It turns out that economic ties with Thailand, including exports to Thailand and Thailand's FDI, play a very important role in Laos' economic growth. Laos recently recorded relatively robust economic growth, but its driving force is weak. That's because Laos' growth engines are very limited and have no resilience to external shocks. Moreover, economic growth has not been linked to an increase in employment because the economy is not diversified and growth in the hydroelectric power sector does not lead to growth in other sectors. Given this, Laos needs to actively take advantage of its geographical proximity to Thailand. It is necessary to create a more active environment for the inflow of FDI in Thailand, to foster resource-based and labor-based manufacturing to take advantage of the Thai market.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.263-287
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• 2013

This study aims to analyse whether outward foreign direct investment(FDI) by Korean manufacturers has a positive or negative effect on the nation's exports and imports. It provides a comprehensive analysis using both micro and macro approaches to overcome the limitations of the previous studies. In its micro-analysis, this study analyzed the impact of the outstanding outward FDI stock and other related factors on net export/import creation using panel data of 589 overseas affiliates of Korean manufacturers during the period of 2006 to 2011. And in the macro-analysis, the study analyzed the impact of outward FDI on exports using panel data of 23 manufacturing sectors during the period of 2000 to 2011. As a result of empirical study, contrary to the results of most previous studies, Korea's export can be negatively affected when it's manufacturing companies increase their outward FDI and localize their overseas businesses.

• Journal of the Economic Geographical Society of Korea
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.65-81
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• 2004

Foreign direct investment (FDI) by firms has various motives in terms of the strategy for firms' long-term growth. This research uses the case study of Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama to analyze the motives of the Korean auto industry's FDI in the U.S. and the locational factors that determined the selection of the site. This paper starts from the question of why Hyundai made the decision to invest in the U.S., which is not favorable in terms of production cost, especially considering that its exports to the U.S. have been on the increase. The results indicate that the strongest motive for the decision to invest in the U.S. was to ameliorate the trade friction between Korea and the U.S. Given that Hyundai depends on the U.S. market to a large extent for its exports, the foremost motive was to use local production in order to reduce the serious trade imbalance in the automobile sector between Korea and the U.S. in order that trade friction with the U.S. may be avoided and causes for trade disputes may be reduced. Other motives such as improving the access to local consumers were of secondary importance. After the selection of the country in which to invest, however, various factors were considered in the decision regarding the location of the plant, and incentives by local governments ultimately played a key role in this decision. The results imply that the Korean manufacturing industry's investment in the U.S. cannot be explained by traditional FDI theories and instead was greatly driven by a strategic defensive motive. In addition, the results confirm that the design of an appropriate incentive structure by host governments is important for attracting FDI.

• Journal of Korea Society of Industrial Information Systems
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.61-72
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• 2013

The relationship between export growth and economic growth in developing countries has been one of the main issues in the growth theory field. Many of empirical studies have been done during the last three decades in order to investigate the export-led growth hypothesis using either time-series or cross-sectional data mainly in developing countries. This paper applies cointegration and error correction models to test causal relationship between export growth and economic growth in the Korean 8 manufacturing industries using the industrial time-series quarterly data over 1975-2010. The export-output relationship is tested by including industrial capital stock and the industrial labor force as exogenous variables. The cointegration and error-correction modelling technique with industrial export and output data have showed the strong evidence that there is a bi-directional causality between industrial export and industrial output in 6 manufacturing industries except wood & pulp and nonmetallic industries.

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.46 no.1
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• pp.1-21
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• 2021

The main purpose of this research is to analyze the changes in investment motivation by year through time series and cross-sectional analysis of the factors and investment decisions of Korean manufacturing companies. According to the investment pattern for Asean from the 1980s to the 19th, the first expansion period was 82 to 86, the average increase in overseas investment for securing foreign raw materials due to the second oil shock, and the second expansion period was a gradual increase in exports to the U.S. in 1987 to 1996. During the first stagnation period, direct investment in Asean stagnated in the aftermath of the 1998-05 Asian crisis, and in the third expansion period, part of the production facilities invested in China were relocated to Asean, increasing Asean's investment to become Korea's largest manufacturing investment in 17. Korea's proportion of investment in Asean surpassed that of mass investment since 10 years ago, and the proportion of investment in manufacturing sector has been transferred from China to Asean, and after 17 years, it has served as an overseas production base connecting China. As such, The main purpose of the research will be to extract the determinant factors and key factors for overseas direct investment and investment patterns in conjunction with global manufacturing companies' production base relocation and investment trends through empirical analysis. This research paper gave basic reference to the motivation and determinant of investment 16 years ago, and analyzed the changes in investment motivation by year and content through empirical analysis, contributing some reasonable purpose to the decision of companies and policy makers interested in overseas direct investment.

• Journal of Korea Trade
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.23-38
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• 2022

Purpose - This paper empirically explores the RCA of electrical equipment trade between China and Korea from the perspective of gross trade and value-added trade. The goal of this paper is to scan the electrical equipment's RCA, the decomposition of gross exports, and the impacts of an exerted shock. Design/methodology - We applied the domestic value-added method in measuring the RCA, which could be more accurate than traditional RCA since it excludes foreign value-added. Based on the research purpose, this paper follows the framework of Koopman, Wang, and Wei (2014)-as extended by Wang, Wei, and Zhu (2018). It extracts the data from the 2019 Multi-regional Input-Output (MRIO) databases compiled by the Asian Development Bank in January 2021. Findings - After rigorous examination, the main findings are as follows: First, the electrical equipment sector maintains a consistent comparative advantage in either assessing method. Second, China exports more gross goods of electrical equipment to the world than South Korea does, but there is a trade deficit with Korea. Third, South Korea and P.R. China are the most significant bilateral partners of foreign value-added sourcing. Finally, it is surprising that there is a shock on electrical equipment; the partner's service, as well as manufacturing sectors, would be affected. Originality/value - This paper explores the revealed comparative advantage between Korea and China from traditional gross export and value-added perspectives. Second, we apply the information from the 2019 MRIO database compiled by the Asian Development Bank in January 2021, reflecting the current situation. Third, this paper analyzes the electrical equipment and the impacts on other parties' sectors. Finally, we carry out the subjects that deserve to be investigated in the future.

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.41 no.2
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• pp.97-121
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• 2016

This study evaluates industrial competitiveness of 34 industries in the 41 countries in terms of several trade indices such as value-added RCA(VRCA) and value added intra-industry trade(VIIT). Conclusions are as follows: First, China is still showing week evidence to replace or overtake Korea in terms of VRCA. Second, it is not supportive of the assertion that the gap between Japan and South Korea had widened in the 1995-2011 period. Third, Korea's exports pattern in the manufacturing sector has shifted from the one featured by developing countries(re-exportation of final goods produced using imported intermediate inputs) to that of the developed (exportation of intermediate goods). According to dynamic panel analysis regressing the RCA gap on the IIT gap, intermediate-goods RCA and the market share gap, the estimated coefficient of the gap between value-added IIT and gross IIT is 0.253 and statistically significant at the 2% level. This implies that increases in IIT or intermediate-goods trade to sustain the global competitiveness are the main reasons for the gap between value-added RCA and gross RCA.

• Korea Trade Review
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• v.48 no.1
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• pp.193-213
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• 2023

The impact of each country's environmental protection and climate change policies on trade is increasing. The strengthening of trade barrier resulted in an increase of Technical Barriers to Trade(TBTs). This international trend carries important implications for Korean manufacturers, which is highly dependent on trade. Discussions on the trade effects of TBT are still ongoing. This study that quantitatively analyzed the effect of TBT on trade have employed a gravity model. As a result of the analysis using the basic model, it was found that the effect of environmental TBT notifications on trade is positive(+) overall. However, the electrical machinery and equipment·electronics industries are negatively affected by environmental TBT. There is a pressing need to preemptively identify the impact of environmental TBT in major countries on the exports of Korean manufacturing industries in order to strengthen the competitiveness of domestic industries and pursue countermeasures.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.191-215
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• 2009

This study extends the previous research into the effects of knowledge spillovers on innovation and regional exports growth by more clearly distinguishing, both theoretically and empirically, two different types of knowledge spillovers, namely product and market knowledge spillovers. More importantly, this research provides insights on their role of knowledge spillovers in shaping regional innovative activities and, eventually, regional export growths. Furthermore, this research makes an important contribution to the understudied market knowledge spillovers by developing two variables that could be used to assess the flow of market knowledge spillovers at the regional level: localization economies and export consulting advice. Using secondary data on eight 2-digit manufacturing industries in ten New Zealand regions over a seven year period, this research found that regional competition, localization economies and the availability of export consulting advice have positively and significantly impact on the regional export growth in New Zealand.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.48
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• pp.79-100
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• 2010

To promote the nation's exports, in Korea several government led programs are alive for procuring and manufacturing goods for export. The trade supporting programs are consisted of Trade Financing Program, Trade Tax Program, and Trade Insurance. The programs are summarized ; First, Trade Financing Program is available to exporters of procuring raw materials and finished goods for export. It is extended with exceptionally low interests from the Korean commercial banks. Second, Trade Tax Program provides whole or part of customs drawback to exporters. customs drawback is' made when exporters meet requirements of Customs for export. Third, Trade Insurance Program cover risks of uncertainty which is beyond the exporters' capacity at low insurance premium. It is suggested that the exporters have deep knowledge of these three programs to their ends. Especially Trade Financing Program and Trade Insurance Program can be a combined work for the financially weak SMEs. Further, there are rooms for these programs to develop to enhance the competitiveness of SME exporters.