The Effect Of Trade Protection Measures On Export Quality Of China's Agricultural Products

As the global economy has increasing uncertainties,some western countries frequently create trade frictions on the grounds of protecting their domestic products from import shocks,and set up trade barriers by raising tariffs.Trade protectionism is rising.Agricultural product trade is an important field of international trade.In recent years,trade protection measures encountered by Chinese country's export agricultural products have increased dramatically.The report of the 19 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China clearly put forward foreign trade development strategy that promotes the formation of a comprehensive opening up.Conducting supply-side structural reforms in the field of foreign trade and improving the quality of export products have become an important development direction for China to move from a major exporting country to a powerful exporting country.Therefore,under the current situation of trade protectionism,exploring the effects and mechanisms of trade protection measures on the quality of export agricultural products will provide a reference for the Chinese government to formulate and improve agricultural development policies and actively respond to trade protectionism.We examine the different trade protectionism barriers encountered by China in combination with the statistical information on trade cases provided by China Trade Relief Information Network.We overcome the shortcomings that the unit value is equal to the product quality method and use the product level regression back stepping method to measure the quality of China 's export agricultural products.We analyze the quality structure characteristics of China 's export agricultural products.Then,based on the trade protection measures provided by the Global Trade Early Warning(GTA)database,we construct a quantitative regression model to analyze the effect of trade protection measures on the quality of China's export agricultural products,the heterogeneity of the effects,empirically test how impact mechanisms technological innovation,export choices and trade transfers work.Based on specific trade protection measures,we construct a difference-in-difference model to test the effect of Japan's positive list system on the quality of China 's export agricultural products.We also consider the location and trade modern and enterprise ownership of export enterprises to analyze the heterogeneity of the impact of Japan 's positive list system on the quality of China's export agricultural products.Meanwhile,we construct a regression model to investigate the impact of SPS measures on the quality of China's export agricultural products.We further analyze the heterogeneity of these effects among enterprises in different regions,enterprises with different ownerships,different trade patterns.We find that the coverage rate of China 's non-tariff import reaches 94%.The quality of China's agricultural products export shows an overall upward t rend from2000 to 2013,and there is a clear U shape change from 2007 to 2012.Animal and plant inspection and quarantine measures have a positive effect on the quality of China's export agricultural products.Compared with traditional trade protectionism,new trade protectionism has a greater impact on the quality of China 's export agricultural products.The animal and plant inspection and quarantine measures implemented by the export destination country can improve the quality of export agricultural products through technological innovation,but weaken the positive impact through export choices and changing export destination countries.The animal and plant inspection and quarantine measures only significantly promote the quality of export agricultural products by enterprises in the eastern region and enterprises engaged in general trade,but have no significant impact on the quality of export agricultural products by enterprises in the central and western regions and enterprises engaged in processing trade.The quality of export agricultural products by enterprises in the eastern region and general trading enterprises is more affected by trade protectionism measures than in the central and western regions and enterprises engaged in processing trade.Animal and plant inspection and quarantine measures implemented by developing countries have a greater impact on the quality of China 's export agricultural products than developed countries.Animal and plant inspection and quarantine measures have no significant impact on the quality of agricultural products export by state-owned enterprises,but have significant positive effect on the quality of export agricultural products by collective enterprises,private enterprises and foreign enterprises.Considering that the trade protectionist measures for agricultural products mainly focus on technical barriers to trade,we further select Japan,which is the largest export market for Chinese agricultural products and has the highest degree of agricultural protection,as the treatment group,and analyze how the Japanese positive list system affects Chinese agricultural export product quality by employing the difference-in-difference method.The empirical results show that the quality of Chinese agricultural products exported to Japan is affected by Japan's positive list system,and there is a significant downward trend.The parallel trend test shows that there is no significant difference in the quality of export agricultural products to Japan and the United States before the implementation of the Japanese positive list system,while the quality of export agricultural products to Japan and to the United States during the period after the implementation of the Japanese positive list system is significant different,which indicates the parallel trend hypothesis holds.The heterogeneity test shows that the implementation of Japan 's positive list system has a greater negative effect on the quality of export agricultural products by enterprises in the central and western regions compared to enterprises in the eastern region.The implementation of Japan's positive list system leads to a substantial decline in the quality of export agricultural products by companies engaged in general trade.Japan 's positive list system has the most restrictive effect on the quality of export agricultural products by collective enterprises,followed by private enterprises,then state-owned enterprises,and the foreign enterprises.We further select the "Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures"(SPS)agreem ent to investigate the impact of health and safety inspection and quarantine measures on the export quality of agricultural products.The empirical results show that the number of notifications of SPS measures has a depressing effect on the export quality of agricultural products,and this depressing effect is more pronounced for enterprises in the central and western regions and enterprises engaged in processing trade.In addition,the increase of SPS measures conducted by developed countries can significantly improve the quality of China's agricultural export products,while the increase of SPS measures conducted by developing countries is not conducive to the improvement in the quality of China 's agricultural export products.Considering the ownership of samples,collective enterprises are the most restrained by the number of notifications of SPS measures,followed by private enterprises,and state-owned enterprises are relatively less restrained.On the contrary,the notification number of SPS measures has a significant effect on the quality of foreign-funded enterprises' agricultural export products.