Estimating international trade status of countries from global liner shipping networks.

ABSTRACT: Maritime shipping is a backbone of international trade and, thus, the world economy. Cargo-loaded vessels travel from one country's port to another via an underlying port-to-port transport network, contributing to international trade values of countries en route. We hypothesize that ports that involve trans-shipment activities serve as a third-party broker to mediate trade between two foreign countries and contribute to the corresponding country's status in international trade. We test this hypothesis using a port-level dataset of global liner shipping services. We propose two indices that quantify the importance of countries in the global liner shipping network and show that they explain a large amount of variation in individual countries' international trade values and related measures.

SUBMITTER: Xu M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7657917 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature