Assessing global good agricultural practices standard adoption: insights from fruit and vegetable farmers in Pakistan

This study examines the challenges Pakistani farmers face in adopting global good agricultural practices (GGAP) and highlights the limitations in infrastructure and cost-based clauses. A questionnaire based on GGAP's fruit and vegetable module version 5.0 was developed and validated by the Department of Environmental Sciences, Government College University, Faisalabad. This was a survey-based study of 15 farmers divided into 5 groups according to their annual farm turnover. The findings of the study indicated that, although the basic paperwork requirements of GGAP were implementable, clauses related to capital investment and technical record-keeping were not. Results showed that 90-100% of farmers considered risk assessments, training, and documentation on their farms. However, 42-56% of clauses related to record-keeping, installation, visual presentation, and infrastructure development, and 24-37% of clauses related to external testing, health, safety, and hygiene were declared not implementable. The study revealed a need for adapting GGAP standards to Pakistan's unique agricultural conditions, suggesting the development of localized standards for more practical implementation. The study's findings highlight crucial insights for policymakers and stakeholders in the agriculture sector and suggest the need for target strategies to overcome implementation barriers and optimize the adaptation of Global GAP in Pakistan that would help to increase exports of agricultural commodities.

Covid-19 in America: Global supply chain reconsidered

This research asks: To what extent has America's reliance on the global supply network aggravated the country's public health and economic crisis; and how did the American government respond to supply chain weaknesses during the early years of the Covid-19 pandemic? This study first assesses important conceptual considerations that explain the expansion of global value chains and the growth of trade interdependencies among nations. Next, an analytical case study observes (1) America's supply chain vulnerability through three major waves of infection, (2) the difficulty to mend weaknesses in the supply linkages once the novel coronavirus spread globally and (3) American government's failures to both anticipate and respond to supply shortages, especially in the health sector. Trump administration's policies failed to ensure a reliable supply of simple personal protective equipment (PPE) for healthcare professionals and hospitals throughout the first three waves of infection. Moreover, state and federal governments' substantial reliance on large manufacturers who have established procurement relationship with government led to continuous nationwide supply shortages throughout 2020. The federal government's inability to engage small and medium manufacturers in the production of critical supplies of PPE and diagnostic tests deepened and prolonged the devastating impacts of the pandemic. Our case study demonstrates that the American government needs to rethink the country's substantial reliance on the global supply chain, and the specific requirements to boost domestic manufacturing capacity. The revitalisation of America's manufacturing ability and the local supply networks will boost the productive power of the nation, strengthen resiliency, reduce vulnerability in disruptive times and prepare the nation for future crises.

Global Value Chain Participation and Green Innovation: Evidence from Chinese Listed Firms

Green innovation is one of the most important approaches to prevent environmental pollution and foster sustainable development. Embedded in the global production networks, manufacturing firms have been found not only to be the main drivers of innovation but also the main polluters in developing countries. However, relatively few studies have systematically considered the effect of global value chain (GVC) participation on green innovation in the context of developing countries. By using a panel dataset of Chinese listed manufacturing firms, this study conducts panel data fixed-effect analyses and uses the instrumental variable two-stage least square model to investigate the effect of GVC participation on firms’ green innovation performance. The results show that increased GVC participation leads to improved green innovation performance of Chinese firms. Meanwhile, further heterogeneity analyses show that the impact of GVC participation on green innovation is more pronounced for firms with greater financial constraints, state-owned firms and firms in labor- or pollution-intensive industries, located in the eastern regions of China. Therefore, this study sheds light on the implication that actively participating in GVC is the key to promoting sustainable growth when facing the need for transformation in developing countries.

Tracking Transfer of Carbon Dioxide Emissions to Countries along the Silk Roads Through Global Value Chains

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has aroused rich discussions about the possible increase in carbon dioxide emission under the arduous global carbon dioxide emission reduction task. Adopting the methods of input-output technique and complex network analysis, we first construct a fairer method to trace carbon dioxide emission transfer based on global value chains, then trace the source of carbon dioxide emission transfer to the Silk Roads countries with a long-term multiple regional input-output database. We find that, first, after the proposal of the BRI, the total direct carbon dioxide emissions of the Silk Roads countries and China's proportion of carbon dioxide emission transfer to the other Silk Roads countries have both declined. Second, the Silk Roads countries are generally the net receivers of carbon dioxide emission transfer, and the inflow is mainly distributed in Southeast Asian countries and core countries in other sub-regions. Then, the transfer of carbon dioxide emission accepted by the Silk Roads countries comes mostly from large developing countries, such as China, Russia, and India, and developed countries, such as the United States, Japan, and Germany. The products are mainly concentrated in energy and chemical industries, as well as heavy industries, such as mining and quarrying, and metal products. We suggest that, due to the high degree of spatial and industrial concentrations of carbon dioxide emission transfer, it is necessary to make targeted policies for these countries and industries to reduce these transfers.

The impact of COVID-19 on global value chains: Disruption in nonessential goods production

Public health measures enacted to mitigate the spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have dampened economic activity by shuttering businesses that provide 'nonessential' goods and services. Not surprisingly, these actions directly impacted demand for nonessential goods and services, but the full impact of this shock on the broader economy will depend on the nature and strength of value chains. In a world where production chains are increasingly fragmented, a shock in one industry (or a group of industries) in one country will affect other domestic industries as well as international trade, leading to impacts on production in other countries. We employ the World Input-Output Database to depict the interdependencies among both industries and countries, which provides a full representation of global value chains. By assuming a homogeneous impact on demand for nonessential goods and services around the world, we demonstrate asymmetric effects on production by industry and international trade, leading to asymmetric relative impacts on national economies. Our results indicate that if demand for nonessential goods and services decreases by 50%, the global gross domestic product will decline by 23%, leading to relative impacts that are larger in China, Indonesia, and some European countries. Also, international trade declines by almost 30%, largely due to a reduction in economic activity associated with the production of raw materials and certain types of manufacturing. This work highlights the relevancy of going beyond measuring the direct effects of COVID-19 and provides insights into how international trade linkages will induce broader economic impacts across the globe.

COVID-19 and Global Supply Chain Configuration: Economic and Emissions Impacts of Australia-China Trade Disruptions

Economic shocks from COVID-19, coupled with ongoing US-China tensions, have raised debates around supply chain (or global value chain) organisation, with China at the centre of the storm. However, quantitative studies that consider the global and economy-wide impacts of rerouting supply chains are limited. This study examines the economic and emissions impacts of reorganising supply chains, using Australia-China trade as an example. It augments the Hypothetical Extraction Method by replacing traditional Input-Output analysis with a Computable General Equilibrium analysis. The estimation results demonstrate that in both exports and imports, a trade embargo between Australia and China – despite being compensated for by alternative supply chains—will cause gross domestic production losses and emissions increases for both countries and the world overall. Moreover, even though all other economies gain from the markets left by China, many of them incur overall gross domestic production losses and emission increases. The finding that the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and India may also suffer from an Australia-China trade embargo, despite a gain in trade volume, suggests that no country should add fuel to the fire. The results suggest that countries need to defend a rules-based trading regime and jointly address supply chain challenges.

Network-Based Driving Force of National Economic Development: A Social Capital Perspective

Network science has been widely applied in theoretical and empirical studies of global value chain (GVC), and many related articles have emerged, forming many more mature and complete analytical frameworks. Among them, the GVC accounting method based on complex network theory is different from the mainstream economics in both research angle and content. In this paper, we build up global industrial value chain network (GIVCN) models based on World Input–Output Database, introduce the theoretical framework of Social Capital, and define the network-based indicators with economic meanings. Second, we follow the econometric framework to analyze the hypothesis and test whether it is true. Finally, we study how the three types of capital constituted by these indicators interact with each other, and discuss their impact on the social capital (economic development level, i.e., GDP). The results prove that the structural capital (industrial status) has a positive impact on the social capital; the relational capital (industrial correlation) has a positive impact on both social capital and structural capital; the cognitive capital (industrial structure) has a small impact on the social capital, structural capital, and relational capital.

Nestedness-Based Measurement of Evolutionarily Stable Equilibrium of Global Production System

A nested structure is a structural feature that is conducive to system stability formed by the coevolution of biological species in mutualistic ecosystems The coopetition relationship and value flow between industrial sectors in the global value chain are similar to the mutualistic ecosystem in nature. That is, the global economic system is always changing to form one dynamic equilibrium after another. In this paper, a nestedness-based analytical framework is used to define the generalist and specialist sectors for the purpose of analyzing the changes in the global supply pattern. We study why the global economic system can reach a stable equilibrium, what the role of different sectors play in the steady status, and how to enhance the stability of the global economic system. In detail, the domestic trade network, export trade network and import trade network of each country are extracted. Then, an econometric model is designed to analyze how the microstructure of the production system affects a country’s macroeconomic performance.

Competitive Conditions in Global Value Chain Networks: An Assessment Using Entropy and Network Analysis

We investigated competitive conditions in global value chains (GVCs) for a period of fifteen years (2000-2014), focusing on sector structure, countries' dominance and diversification. For this purpose, we used data from the World Input-Output Database (WIOD) and examined GVCs as weighted directed networks, where countries are the nodes and value added flows are the edges. We compared the in-and out-weighted degree centralization of the sectoral GVC networks in order to detect the most centralized, on the import or export side, respectively (oligopsonies and oligopolies). Moreover, we examined the in- and out-weighted degree centrality and the in- and out-weight entropy in order to determine whether dominant countries are also diversified. The empirical results reveal that diversification (entropy) and dominance (degree) are not correlated. Dominant countries (rich) become more dominant (richer). Diversification is not conditioned by competitiveness.

Visualizing Research on Industrial Clusters and Global Value Chains: A Bibliometric Analysis

In the current digital era, the borders amongst firms are getting blurred when it comes to value creation. Therefore, the traditional configuration of the value chain is frequently replaced by other ones which include the collaborative participation of different agents. Within this context, global value chains, where the value activities are located in different countries, and industrial clusters, which combine competition and cooperation, are attracting a growing attention of both business leaders and scholars in the recent years. Through a bibliometric analysis, this paper disentangles the intellectual and conceptual structure of the research topic of industrial clusters and global value chains. Results show the multidisciplinary character of the topic, including papers published in different areas, such as business, regional studies and world development, as well as its close link with aspects like innovation, regional development, governance or organization. Finally, this study remarks the research lines that could attract more attention in the immediate future.

The challenges and opportunities of a global health crisis: the management and business implications of COVID-19 from an Asian perspective

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak a pandemic. As the evolution and implications of the COVID-19 crisis are still unfolding, we posit that exploring the experiences and strategic responses of Asian countries may shed light on ways to combat COVID-19 for the rest of the world. In this paper, we first articulate the importance of resilience, strategic agility, and entrepreneurship in the context of the fight against COVID-19. Then, with the focus on China, South Korea, and Singapore, we discuss the impact COVID-19 is having on economies and businesses, governmental support for businesses and societies, and implications for global supply chain disruptions. We hope that the global health system will recover quickly, and that the world economy will be revitalized with the contributions and collaboration of science (including social science), industry, and governments.

Unfolding the Complexity of the Global Value Chain: Strength and Entropy in the Single-Layer, Multiplex, and Multi-Layer International Trade Networks

The worldwide trade network has been widely studied through different data sets and network representations with a view to better understanding interactions among countries and products. Here we investigate international trade through the lenses of the single-layer, multiplex, and multi-layer networks. We discuss differences among the three network frameworks in terms of their relative advantages in capturing salient topological features of trade. We draw on the World Input-Output Database to build the three networks. We then uncover sources of heterogeneity in the way strength is allocated among countries and transactions by computing the strength distribution and entropy in each network. Additionally, we trace how entropy evolved, and show how the observed peaks can be associated with the onset of the global economic downturn. Findings suggest how more complex representations of trade, such as the multi-layer network, enable us to disambiguate the distinct roles of intra- and cross-industry transactions in driving the evolution of entropy at a more aggregate level. We discuss our results and the implications of our comparative analysis of networks for research on international trade and other empirical domains across the natural and social sciences.