Book Review: Ajitava Roy Chowdhury and Prabir De, International Trade in Services in India: Implications for Growth and Inequality in a Globalizing World

AuthorBibek Ray Chaudhuri
Date01 February 2013
DOI10.1177/001573251204800110
Published date01 February 2013
Subject MatterBook Review
Book Review
Ajitava Roy Chowdhury and Prabir De, International Trade in Services in
India: Implications for Growth and Inequality in a Globalizing World.
Oxford University Press. 2012. ISBN: 0-19-807937-0.
The book is a good attempt to highlight the contemporary issues in services trade.
Theoretical exposition to various services trade modes including outsourcing and
component trade forms the backbone for later discussions. Services trade related
to production structure, immigration etc. is discussed with reference to their wel-
fare implications. Change in structure of services is dealt with at length across
developing countries. Travel and transport services have emerged as the leading
exporting sectors over time for the developing countries. Revealed Comparative
Advantage (RCA) is calculated for the various sectors to measure their competi-
tiveness for selected developing countries.
Thereafter the authors turn their attention to trade in services in India. Services
trade profile for the country and competitiveness have been discussed at length.
Based on annualized growth rates of share of GDP, ‘communication’ services seems
to have grown at the highest rate also attracting the highest share of inward FDI. In
terms of exports, ‘financial and business services’ have grown at the highest rate
between the year 2000 and 2007. In terms of change in composition of services,
exports share of ‘travel’ have declined whereas share of ‘financial services’, ‘com-
puter and information services’ and ‘personal, cultural and recreational services’
have gained importance between the years 2000 and 2010. This change is also
reflected in the competitiveness measures (RCA). Authors briefly discuss India’s
stance on services at WTO and domestic liberalization measures undertaken.
Services Trade Facilitation Index (STFI) is constructed comprising of indica-
tors related to infrastructure availability across countries. Principal Component
Analysis is used to construct this index. Scandinavian countries rank high in terms
of trade facilitation. Most of the countries barring a few did not show changes in
ranking over time implying rigidity to changes in facilitation measures. India
ranks 32 among the countries included for analysis revealing a considerable scope
for improvement in services trade facilitation.
The rest of the chapters are a collection of empirical work on various aspects
of services trade. Services trade flows for India are analyzed through relationship
Foreign Trade Review
48(1) 161–163
©2013 Indian Institute of
Foreign Trade
SAGE Publications
Los Angeles, London,
New Delhi, Singapore,
Washington DC
DOI: 10.1177/001573251204800110
http://ftr.sagepub.com

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