CEFTA as Trade Agreement and Its Role in Its Countries＇ Economic Development and E.U. Integration （Case of Albania）

CEE （Central Eastern European） region comprises a group of countries at a relatively similar stage of economic development and with the common objective of becoming member of EU. The size of the market has pushed CEE countries to find ways towards a larger market. Joint forces, into free trade agreements, have contributed to their economic growth and European Integration. How did it happened, and what are the consequences of free trade agreements, under the example of Albania, it has been studied and analyzed, through data collections from different sources like the WB, IMF, National Banks, business round table discussions, etc.. Among all the free trade agreements CEFTA has shown to be the most effective. Central European Free Trade Agreement, CEFTA, since 2006, has been a tool to businesses making the rules and regulations governing trade in the European Region. It has contributed to make trade simpler and increasingly harmonized all procedures with those of the EU and the WTO （World Trade Organization）. As a conclusion, CEFTA experience has shown to have improved considerably business ability of developing European economies, to trade with the EU countries and the world. CEFTA has created an attractive market for investments while before the market in the Region was fragmented and unattractive to important investments, has promoted growth, and contributed to job creation. Albania is a recent success of it.

Asian Trade Integration and the Decoupling Debate of Business Cycles

＂Decoupling＂ refers to the divergence of business cycles among different countries, while ＂re-coupling＂ corresponds to the convergence or the synchronization of business cycles among different countries. The decoupling debate is popular in the field of economics, especially after global financial crisis. As trade integration increased among Asian countries, business cycle synchronization among these countries was expected to increase through trade transmission. The aim of this study is to discover whether there has been decoupling or convergence of business cycles through various trade channels. However, theoretically, increased trade can lead to business cycle synchronization either rising or falling. Inter-industry trade resulting in higher specification will induce less synchronized business cycles, while intra-industry trade could lead to increased business cycle synchronization. Thus, it is important to distinguish between intra- and inter-industry trade flows. Both correlation and dynamic factor models are utilized to study the evolution of global business cycle linkages. Results indicate that the world factor has become less important in explaining macroeconomic fluctuations from sub-period 1961-1984 to sub-period 1985-2007, while regional factors do not play an important role in explaining aggregate volatility, with the expectation of consumption. Overall, the explanatory power of country factors increases. Domestic consumption and domestic investment variances are more driven by country and idiosyncratic factors than by the world factor, contrary to the output growth fluctuations. Regional factors and country factors also play a more prominent role in explaining gross import fluctuations than in explaining gross exports. Results cast doubt on the strong forms of both the decoupling and the re-coupling hypothesis.

The Dos and Don’ts of the African Continental Free Trade Agreement Pose the Ghana’s Maritime Industry Vis-A-Vis Its National Industrialization Drive

The direct and indirect immensely contributions of free trade blocs/single market integration to the steadilygrowth of developed emergence and least developed economies are unmeasurable. The increasing insatiable demand and approval of the free trade model by almost all of the six continents to enhance their economic development has proved that its benefits have indeed outweighed the challenges. Therefore, this research just like the other internationally recognised literatures on this market system, intends to analysis the impacts of the important/dos, don’ts, opportunities, prospects and other important factors of the recent AU member States unanimously endorsement of AfFCTA’s implementation, will have on Ghana’s maritime industry. The possible quantitative findings in this study do uphold its immensely potential benefits impact on the African and Ghana’s maritime industry development and at the same time, indicate an irresistible gap pertaining to the downward progress of its implementation within the sector. These findings have apparently revealed that loss of revenue from scrapping off customs tariffs carries the highest percentage of all the challenges facing AfCFTA’s implementation and recommend that there must be an effective investment-oriented measures-FDI in harnessing the opportunities and prospects embedded in AfCFTA so as to accelerate Ghana’s maritime industry development in its implementation process.

Bidding Strategy of a Virtual Power Plant Considering Carbon-electricity Trading

Virtual power plant(VPP)aggregates large amounts of distributed energy and controllable loads.The comprehensive consideration of carbon emissions and electricity transactions has great significance in improving the VPP operation’s economic efficiency.In this paper,the bidding strategy of the VPP by considering the carbon-electricity integration trading in an auxiliary service(AS)market is studied.First of all,the basic structure and operating features of the VPP are briefly introduced.Then,the bidding strategy model of carbon-electricity integration trading in an auxiliary service market is proposed and the corresponding objective function and the constraint conditions are also analyzed.Furthermore,the GAMS solver is utilized to give the optimal solution of the bidding strategy model.Finally,the effectiveness of the bidding strategy of a VPP based on the consideration of carbon-electricity integration trading is verified through simulation cases.

North American Free Trade Area and World Economic Regional Integration

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Unemployment and Economic Integration for Developing Countries

While financial or trade integration between countries may mcrease the size of the market and aid the adoption of more advanced technologies, will it also increase the level of urban unemployment for a developing country？ In this model, there is unemployment in the urban sector. Manufacturing firms engage in oligopolistic competition and choose increasing returns technologies to maximize profits. Financial firms provide capital to manufacturing firms and they also engage in oligopolistic competition. We show that an increase in the wage rate in the manufacturing sector changes neither the level of technology nor the level of employment in the manufacturing sector. While financial or trade integration between developing countries leads manufacturing firms to adopt more advanced technologies, the level and rate of employment in the manufacturing sector will not deteriorate.

Ties Binding Asia,Europe and the USA

We investigate changes in Asia＇s regional and global trade linkages and their influence on macroeconomic relationships among Asia, Europe and the USA. We first document changes in tripartite trade patterns and discuss sO, lized facts about East Asia ＂s trade structure, with particular focus on the role of China. China plays a critical role in the rapidly expanding intra-Asian trade as an assembly and produetion center that supplies final goods for the advanced economies. However, China ＂s trade shares in final goods with East Asia and in parts and components with Europe and the USA are rising, suggesting that the region ＂s production chains are becoming increasingly integrated into the global business network. Empirical results from a panel vector autoregression model generally confirm increasingly mutual macroeconomic interdependence among East Asia, Europe and the USA. The findings suggest a future role for Asia as an important trade partner and balancing power in the world economy.

Industry Competitiveness and Complementarity between China and Eurasian Economic Union Countries under the Background of Strategic Docking between Silk Road Economic Belt and the Union

The implementation of strategic docking between Silk Road Economic Bclt and the Eurasian Economic Union(the Union)is of great significance to facilitate the stable expansion of bilateral trade volume,diversification in major areas of trade,and the continual improvement of technical content level of trade products.This paper first uses the revealed comparative advantage index to study the competitiveness of industries with different technical levels for China and the Union member countries.Then,the trade complementarity and trade integration between China the Union member countries are studied by using the trade complementarity index and trade intensity index.Based on these results,the paper gives some advice on expanding and deepening the bilateral cconomic and trade cooperation.

Reform and opening up in the area of circulation:a retrospect

China＇s reform and opening up in the area of circulation are an important component of the establishment of a socialist mgrket economy system. Prior to reform and opening up, this area had long been characterized by a high level of centralization, closedness and segmentation. The domestic market was isolated from the overseas market and internal trade from foreign trade, and each had its own management system and policy environment. The thirty years of reform and opening up, however, have put a new face on the institutional environment of circulation： an open and modern system of circulation has been basically established, an embryonic WTO-consistent business administration system is taking shape, and the extension Of business and trade service ixidustries has facilitated institutional innovation. The main experience of reform is the following： first, taking opening up as the leading principle and making use of opening up to promote reform; second, following an incremental path of dealing with the easier issues before the harder ones, building up while you tear down, and gradual improvement; and third, breaking through the traditional framework of commodity circulation and establishing new business systems that accommodate more service industries. The economic implication of China＇s reform experience is as follows： an export-oriented strategy must inevitably be chosen as the point of entry for reform; there is an inherent linkage between market structure and human capital in the circulation of goods and services; and expanding the circulation of non-material goods is an important basis for institutional innovation.