Trade Liberalization and Sustainable Management of Renewable Resources

2019 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 17K03732
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Economic policy
• Research Institution: Nanzan University
• Principal Investigator: Takarada Yasuhiro 南山大学, 経済学部, 教授 (60327137)
• Project Period (FY): 2017-04-01 – 2020-03-31
• Keywords: 国際貿易 / 再生可能資源 / 資源管理 / 技術的規制

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This project focuses on global renewable resources that are shared by countries. We focus on technology standards (e.g., restrictions on fishing gears, vessels, areas, and time), which are most commonly implemented in fisheries, to show the effects of trade liberalization on the level of the shared renewable resource and welfare. Technology standards are modeled as a restriction on the harvesting technology, i.e., under strict technology standards, firms exploit resources as if they are using inferior harvesting technology.
We find that an opening up of trade may reduce the shared stock and cause steady-state utility to decrease in a resource-good importing country and increase in a resource-good exporting country. Strikingly, when the shared stock is in jeopardy (a high demand for the harvest), steady-state harvest is maximized after an opening up of trade by what we call multilateral resource management in this paper and both countries gain from trade.

Free Research Field

国際貿易論

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

複数国が共有するグローバルな再生可能資源（漁業資源）に焦点を当て、資源管理政策として世界的に最も導入が進んでいる技術的規制の効果を、2国間で互いに資源財を貿易し、技術的規制を課す状況で分析した。技術的規制は産出量規制と比べて効率性が低いといわれるが、資源需要が強い場合には、資源保護に効果的で、両国はとも貿易利益を得ることが明らかとなった。資源需要が強まっている状況でこそ、まず技術的規制を適切に各国が行うことが重要であるといえる。