The Impact of Disasters on International Trade

Abstract

Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen:Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden.Sie dürfen die Dokumente nicht für öffentliche oder kommerzielle Zwecke vervielfältigen, öffentlich ausstellen, öffentlich zugänglich machen, vertreiben oder anderweitig nutzen.Sofern die Verfasser die Dokumente unter Open-Content-Lizenzen (insbesondere CC-Lizenzen) zur Verfügung gestellt haben sollten, gelten abweichend von diesen Nutzungsbedingungen die in der dort genannten Lizenz gewährten Nutzungsrechte. Terms of use: Documents in AbstractIn this paper we examine the impact of major disasters on international trade flows using a gravity model. Our panel data consists of more than 170 countries for the years 1962-2004 yielding approximately 300,000 observations. We find that the driving forces determining the impact of such events are the democracy level and, to a lesser extent, the area of the affected country. The less democratic and the smaller a country the more are its trade flows reduced in case it is struck by a disaster. We are also able to distinguish between the effect of a disaster on an importing and an exporting country.

The asymmetric impact of natural disasters on China's bilateral trade

“…Gassebner et al (2006) quantitatively estimated these impacts on international trade at global scale. They found that disasters reduced trade in both exporter and importer countries.…”

“…From a global perspective, natural disasters have negative trade effects (Oh and Reuveny, 2010;Gassebner et al, 2006). However, if we focus on a specific country or region, the result may be totally different.…”

“…It is widely accepted that developed countries are more resilient to natural disasters; however, whether trade between them and China is also more resilient is inconclusive. In addition, Gassebner et al (2006) claims that the physical size of a country appears to play a role in terms of natural disaster trade effects. Consequently, our model is built as…”

Do Natural Disasters Hurt Tax Resource Mobilization?

“…Natural disasters may affect international trade tax revenues through their impacts on the flows of international trade. Gassebner, Keck and The (2006) argue that the impact of a disaster on international trade can be transmitted either directly or indirectly. Direct impacts on exports can occur due to human losses and injuries (to company staff and manpower) and the destruction and damage of physical capital and equipment in the export sector.…”

“…Studies including Anbarci, Escaleras and Register (2005), Kahn (2005), Gassebner, Keck and The (2006) highlight that governance is a key driver in determining the magnitude of the effect caused by natural disasters. Countries that are well-governed are better at coping with disasters.…”