The Impact of Imports from China on African Textile Exports

DOI

10.2991/jat.k.201126.001How to use a DOI?

Keywords

African textile exports; textile imports from China; comparative advantage; crowding-out effect; intermediate goods effect

Abstract

This study uses Comtrade trade data covering 1990–2017, 14 textile subsectors, and 53 African countries with their main trade partners to evaluate Chinese trade impacts on African textile exports over three subperiods at the sector level. It finds that, although textile imports from China had a significant positive impact during the first period, this effect disappeared in the second period. From 2009 to 2017, the impact became significantly negative. I explain these results by arguing that Chinese products exert both intermediate goods and crowding-out effects on African local producers. During the first period, the intermediate goods effect exceeded the crowding-out effect, and helped to strengthen African textile production and exportation. Over time, however, the net crowding-out effect was increasing. In the last period, imports from China reduced Africa’s exports. This study, thus, raises a concern about African “premature deindustrialization”, presumably as a consequence of the continent’s trade with China.

Copyright

© 2020 African Export-Import Bank. Publishing services by Atlantis Press International B.V.

Open Access

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

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TY  - JOUR
AU  - Yong He
PY  - 2020
DA  - 2020/12/03
TI  - The Impact of Imports from China on African Textile Exports
JO  - Journal of African Trade
SP  - 60
EP  - 68
VL  - 7
IS  - 1-2
SN  - 2214-8523
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/jat.k.201126.001
DO  - 10.2991/jat.k.201126.001
ID  - He2020
ER  -