Study On The Impact Of Trade Facilitation On China’s Tea Export To RCEP Countries

At present,China is not only the world’s largest tea producer,but also a major tea exporter.Trade facilitation provides a coordinated and predictable trading environment for international trade activities by optimizing procedures in trade activities,harmonizing applicable laws and regulations,standardizing construction and improving infrastructure.The signing of the RCEP agreement means that tea trade between China and RCEP countries will further develop.Therefore,taking China’s tea export to RCEP countries as the research object and analyzing the impact and role of trade facilitation is of great significance to further promote China’s tea export.Based on the "transaction cost theory","comparative advantage theory" and "regional trade liberalization theory",with the impact of trade facilitation on China’s tea export RCEP countries as the research objective,the cost effect and adjustment effect analysis were carried out,and the conclusions were obtained:Infrastructure construction,regulatory environment construction,customs environment construction and business environment construction have cost effect,while GDP,geographical distance,population size,exchange rate and other factors have moderating effect.Data show that the potential of China’s tea export to RCEP countries is considerable,and its trade volume has increased by 249.56%in the past decade.Vietnam and Malaysia are the first and second markets of China’s tea export among RCEP countries,respectively.China’s tea export volume to RCEP countries shows a zigzag upward trend,and the overall development is stable but making progress.The trade facilitation level of RCEP countries is calculated according to the scores of the indicators of infrastructure,regulatory environment,customs environment and business environment of RCEP countries.It can be seen from the comparison that the Philippines,Brunei,Laos,Vietnam,Myanmar,Cambodia and Thailand are countries with unfavorable trade conditions.South Korea,Indonesia,Australia belong to the general trade facilitation countries;Japan,Malaysia and New Zealand are countries with relatively convenient trade.Singapore is one of those countries where trade is very convenient.On this basis,tea export data of China to RCEP countries from 2012 to 2021 are selected to build an extended gravity model,and the impact of trade facilitation on China’s tea export to RCEP countries is empirically analyzed.The results show that:China’s tea export volume is positively correlated with the total GDP of RCEP countries.It is negatively correlated with the distance between RCEP countries and China.It is positively correlated with the level of trade facilitation of RCEP countries.It is positively correlated with the population of RCEP countries.It is negatively correlated with the exchange rates of RCEP countries.The fluctuation of trade facilitation level will change the trade potential of China’s tea export to RCEP countries.To this end,specific suggestions have been put forward to continuously improve the level of j oint transport,actively provide support to RCEP countries,improve the quality of Chinese tea and tap the potential of RCEP tea market.