Yu Wang, PhD candidate, and Prof. LIU Bin—both team members from the China Institute for WTO Studies, WTO Chair at UIBE—co-authored an academic paper titled "The Impact of Digital Trade Rules on Services Trade: An Empirical Investigation from the DVA Perspective," which was recently published in the Review of International Economics.

This study examines the characteristics and trends of global services trade using bilateral sector-level panel data from 64 economies between 1996 and 2018. The findings highlight three key shifts in the global services trade network: expansion, densification, and de-modularization. Moreover, leading services exporters have largely maintained their dominant positions, benefiting from first-mover advantages.

The study further explores the positive impact of digital trade rules on the DVA of services trade. By applying text analysis techniques, the research quantifies the openness of digital trade rules and reveals that both the broadness and depth of digital trade rules contribute to enhancing the DVA of services trade.

Additionally, the study uncovers heterogeneous effects of digital trade rules depending on sectoral, economy-specific, and agreement-specific characteristics. Highly digitalized service sectors and economies with well-developed regulatory frameworks experience even greater positive impacts.

The findings of this research highlight the critical role of comprehensive digital trade rules in promoting global services trade, suggesting that economies can benefit from active participation in digital trade negotiations, the broadening and deepening of digital trade provisions in FTAs, and the strengthening of regulatory frameworks to fully leverage the advantages of digital integration.

Find out more about the publication: https://doi.org/10.1111/roie.12803