Does Green Food Certification promote agri-food export quality?Evidence from China

The construction of a food certification system plays a vital role in upgrading export quality, which previous studies have largely overlooked. We match China's industry-level data of Green Food Certification with its HS6-digit export data of agri-food products to quantify the impact of Green Food Certification on export quality. We identify the significant and positive effect of Green Food Certification on export quality. The 2SLS estimation based on instrumental variables and a range of robustness checks confirm the validity and robustness of the benchmark conclusions. Further analysis discloses that Green Food Certification improves export quality by raising agricultural production efficiency and brand premiums. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the effect of Green Food Certification varies across regions, notably improving the quality of agri-food products exported to developed regions and regions with high levels of import supervision. Furthermore, among various product types, Green Food Certification significantly improves the export quality of primary products and products vulnerable to non-tariff measures. The above findings could guide the future development of agri-food quality certification systems, potentially leading to a transformation and promotion of the agri-food trade.

Factor input structure,environmental policies,and the export quality upgrade:a perspective of heterogeneity

In the analysis of how environmental regulation affects the comparative advantage of trade,existing literature ignores industry's inherent heterogeneity, which draws remarkably different conclusions. In view of this, the paper analyzed the mechanism of environmental regulation on the export quality of different industries from the perspective of factor input structure heterogeneity. Based on the panel data of China's manufacturing industry, the paper used the system generalized method of moments method to examine the heterogeneity influence of environmental regulation on manufacturing export quality. The study found that, first, environmental regulation affected the export quality upgrade of the manufacturing sector through offset effect and compensation effect, and the direction of the impact would mainly depend on the industry's factor input structure. Second, for industries with larger fixed-asset investment(FAI) ratio in the factor input structure, the current environmental regulation policy was not conducive to the export quality upgrading of the industries. However, there was a significant U-shaped dynamic relationship between them. As environmental regulations became stricter, when regulatory stringency went beyond the inflection point, the policy would promote the upgrading of export quality. But for industries with smaller proportion of FAI, environmental regulation exerted a favorable impact on the export quality upgrade, following a J-shaped marginal growth curve.Third, for industries with different factor input structure, their export quality had been effectively upgraded as expected by factors like human capital investment, independent R&D, technology introduction, and foreign direct investment; but raising per capita capital stock and expanding enterprise size did not produce significant direct impact on export quality upgrade. These conclusions remained robust after using different measurement methods and replacing with other variables. Therefore, this paper suggests that governments should take industry heterogeneity into consideration and formulate differentiated hierarchical environmental policies.Besides, they should strengthen the enforcement of the current environmental regulation policies. By doing so, enterprises are forced to improve their technology and product quality so that they can better cope with rising compliance costs, eliminate backward industries, and resolve excess capacity. In this way, the economic structure would be transformed and upgraded from the supply side.

Import and Export Quality Guaranteed for the Steady Development of Foreign Trade

Under the good situation of the reform and opening to the outside world, the rapid development of foreign economic and trade has resulted in enhancing the inspection work of import and export commodities in China. The commodity inspection organs at all level adhere to the work policy of guaranteeing quality and offering better service, making import and export commodity quality as their central task. They strictly implement national laws and regulations to serve commodity inspection and management, thus achieving great success.

China Import and Export Commodity Quality Certificate Centre (CQC)

The CQC is an independent and impartial quality certificate organization with third party status established by the State Import and Export Commodity Inspection Administration (SCIA) in accordance with the Law of Commodity Inspection and granted its duties and obligations by the State Council.The main aspects of its duties and obligations include: implementing the certification of import commodity safety and quality; the certification of the quality control system and the

Quality Guaranteed for Export and Import Commodities

Our commodity inspection departments have been focusing their efforts on upgrading their testing and inspection to ensure the high quality of import and export commodities. Thus they have achieved progress and breakthroughs in all aspects of their work and safeguarded China’s rights and interests and its foreign trade reputation. According to statistics, some 1.888 million batches of import and export commodities were inspected in 1996, worth us$91.82 billion——19.95 percent and 16.20 percent increase respectively over the previous year. Of these, export commodities accounted for 1.

Upgrade Quality to Expand Export

The Chongqing Cereals, Oils & Foodstuffs Import and Export Corporation is a key professional foreign trade company in Chongqing City, Sichuan Province. With a 38-year history, the company has grown into one of China’s Top 500 foreign trading companies. The commodities handled by the company have increased from an original few in the 1950s into hundreds. Chemical products, medical products,

Quality of Chinese Export Toys Is Trustworthy

On September 4th, 2007, AQSIQ and the Press Office of the State Council invited 13 media representatives from countries such as America, Britain, France, Japan, Canada, Singapore to visit the Technical Center Toy Laboratory of Guangdong Entry-exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau, Zhentai (China) Industrial Limited Company and Guangdong Xinboxing Toys Limited Company.……

International Patent Cooperation,Patent Prosecution Highway Agreements,and Export Product Quality

This paper investigates how international cooperation for patent examination using Patent Prosecution Highway(PPH)agreements has affected the quality of firms'exports.Taking the PPH agreements signed between China and the export destinations as a quasi-natural experiment,we established a difference-in-difference-in-differences model.We found that international cooperation for patent examination caused firms to increase export quality to PPH partners in patent-intensive industries to a greater extent.This effect was more profound among PPH partners with stronger intellectual property protection,diferentiated products and core products,and agreements along with the Patent Cooperation Treaty.We also found that PPH agreements increased the number of Chinese patent applications filed in PPH partners,patent applications by PPH partners in China,and the level of innovation,all of which constitute the major channels through which export quality to PPH partners increases.Our findings demonstrate that international patent cooperation has played an important role in promoting international trade quality.

Seasonal exports of phosphorus from intensively fertilised nested grassland catchments

We carried out a one year （2002） study of phosphorus （P） loss from soil to water in three nested grassland catchments with known P input in chemical fertilizer and animal liquid slurry applications. Chemical fertilizer was applied to the grasslands between March and September and animal slurry was applied over the twelve months. The annual chemical P fertilizer applications for the 17 and 211 ha catchments were 16.4 and 23.7 kg P/ha respectively and the annual slurry applications were 10.7 and 14.0 kg P/ha, respectively. The annual total phosphorus （TP） export in stream-flow was 2.61, 2.48 and 1.61 kg P/ha for the 17, 211 and 1524 ha catchments, respectively, compared with a maximum permissible （by regulation） annual export of ca. 0.35 kg P/ha. The export rate （ratio of P export to P in land applications） was 9.6% and 6.6% from the 17 and 211 ha catchments, respectively. On average, 70% of stream flow and 85% of the P export occurred during the five wet months （October to February） indicating that when precipitation is much greater than evaporation, the hydrological conditions are most favourable for P export. However the soil quality and land use history may vary the results. Particulate P made up 22%, 43% and 37% of the TP export at the 17, 211 and 1524 ha catchment areas, respectively. As the chemical fertilizer was spread during the grass growth months （March to September）, it has less immediate impact on stream water quality than the slurry applications. We also show that as the catchment scale increases, the P concentrations and P export decrease, confirming dilution due to increasing rural catchment size. In the longer term, the excess P from fertilizer maintains high soil P levels, an antecedent condition favourable to P loss from soil to water. This study confirms the significant negative water quality impact of excess P applications, particularly liquid animal slurry applications in wet winter months. The findings suggest that restricted P application in wet months can largely reduce the P losses from soil to water.