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Services as a share of gross domestic product and in foreign direct investment flows have increased in importance both globally and in the transition countries of Europe and Central Asia. So has the need for both academics and policymakers to understand the impacts of services liberalization in the transition countries. For this reason, the World Bank Institute, under a grant from the Government of Austria, commissioned seven studies under the auspices of the Economic Education Research Consortium (headquartered in Kiev, Ukraine) to investigate the impact of services liberalization on productivity, focusing on services reform in the transition countries of Europe and Central Asia. All of the studies have been produced by authors from the transition countries of Europe or Central Asia. This paper summarizes six of these studies that will appear in a volume in Russian edited by the author of this paper. The studies contribute to the growing empirical literature establishing that liberalization of barriers against service providers can make an important contribution to increase total factor productivity, exports and growth in the economy. They also show that the issue of services liberalization is important for the transition countries in particular. Links to the English language versions of the papers are provided.

Banks & Banking Reform --- Commonwealth of Independent States --- E-Business --- Econometric estimates --- Economic Theory & Research --- Emerging Markets --- Firm level data --- ICT Policy and Strategies --- International Economics & Trade --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Productivity impacts --- Services liberalization

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The authors estimate the impact of aggregate indicators of "soft" and "hard" infrastructure on the export performance of developing countries. They build four new indicators for 101 countries over the period 2004-07. Estimates show that trade facilitation reforms do improve the export performance of developing countries. This is particularly true with investment in physical infrastructure and regulatory reform to improve the business environment. Moreover, the findings provide evidence that the marginal effect of infrastructure improvement on exports appears to be decreasing in per capita income. In contrast, the impact of information and communications technology on exports appears increasingly important for richer countries. Drawing on estimates, the authors compute illustrative exports growth for developing countries and ad-valorem equivalents of improving each indicator halfway to the level of the top performer in the region. As an example, improving the quality of physical infrastructure so that Egypt's indicator increases half-way to the level of Tunisia would increase exports by 10.8 percent. This is equivalent to a 7.4 percent cut in tariffs faced by Egyptian exporters across importing markets.

Administrative procedures --- Benefit analysis --- Cartels --- Comparative Advantage --- Decision making --- Econometric estimates --- Economic activity --- Economic development --- Economic Growth --- Economic Theory & Research --- Empirical evidence --- Empirical research --- Environment --- Environmental Economics & Policies --- Free Trade --- Highways --- International Economics and Trade --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Metals --- Real wages --- Resource allocation --- Returns to scale --- Roads --- Trade Policy --- Transaction costs --- Transparency --- Transport --- Transport Economics Policy & Planning --- True

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This paper examines the extent to which the growth of China and India in world markets is affecting the patterns of trade specialization in Latin American economies. The authors construct Vollrath's measure of revealed comparative advantage by 3-digit ISIC sector, country, and year. This measure accounts for both imports and exports. The empirical analyses explore the correlation between the revealed comparative advantage of Latin America and the two Asian economies. Econometric estimates suggest that the specialization pattern of Latin A-with the exception of Mexico-has been moving in opposite direction of the trade specialization pattern of China and India. Labor-intensive sectors (both unskilled and skilled) probably have been negatively affected by the growing presence of China and India in world markets, while natural resource and scientific knowledge intensive sectors have probably benefited from China and India's growth since 1990.

Comparative advantage --- Econometric estimates --- Economic Theory and Research --- Exports --- Free Trade --- Global integration --- Gross domestic product --- Industry --- International Economics & Trade --- Macroeconomics and Economic Growth --- Market share --- Markets and Market Access --- Patterns of trade --- Public Sector Development --- Specialization --- Terms of trade --- Trade Policy --- Water and Industry --- Water Resources --- World markets