贸易自由化背景下农产品贸易成本初探

The Trade Cost of Agricultural Product in the International Trade Liberalization

贸易成本是当今研究国际贸易文献的重要课题之一,其研究已经逐步由总贸易成本转向各种产业及其产品层面。农产品贸易是国际贸易的特殊领域,其发展受到诸多因素影响。农产品贸易成本形式很复杂,分为政策成本与环境成本。政策成本主要是关税、配额及其他非关税壁垒等;环境成本涵盖运输、保险和时间成本。农产品贸易成本是产业层面贸易成本的一种,其将存在于农产品贸易领域的众多阻碍因素简化为一个参数,可以直观地反映农产品贸易领域的阻碍水平,可以作为评价农产品贸易自由化与便利化措施效果的指标。农产品贸易领域存在着较高的政策成本与环境成本,使得农产品贸易成本表现出与一般贸易成本不同的特点,主要是农产品贸易成本高且降低困难,对发展中国家的影响更为巨大,以及农产品贸易成本的效果具有两面性。现阶段在多边贸易体制下依靠贸易便利化来降低农产品贸易成本,可以带来比较多的正面效应,提高农业生产效率和减少农业贫困人口。

Trade cost is a staple ingredient in today＇s trade literature. The focus of trade cost research has been gradually changed from the general trade cost to the concrete trade cost at the level of industry and commodity. The trade of agricultural product is a special field in international trade and is affected by many factors. The trade cost of agricultural product appears quite complexly and is divided into policy cost and environmental cost. Policy cost mainly involves such costal factors as tariff, quota and non-tariff barriers; environmental cost covers such costal factors as transportation, insurance and time. The trade cost of agricultural product, which is quite different from common trade costs, is characterized by high cost, easily increasing cost and hardly decreasing cost, which usually produce a great impact on developing countries. In addition, the effect of the trade cost of agricultural product usually is both positive and negative. In the current multilateral trade system, employing trade facilitation to reduce the trade cost of agricultural products will produce more positive effects, improve agricultural productivity and reduce the poverty-stricken agricultural population.