Economic Effects of Early Voluntary Sectoral Liberalization on the Korean Economy Jai-Won Ryou, Honggue Lee
We examined the merits of the proposals for early voluntary sectoral liberalization (EVSL) as applied to Korea by considering their potential effects on welfare and trade flows. For that purpose, we took up 15 commodity sectors for analysis. (For nine of them, the liberalization plan is supposed to be implemented immediately, and, for the remaining six, their liberalization is to be carried out later.)

We first looked at the patterns of comparative advantage of these sectors. According to the revealed comparative indices calculated for the sectors considered, Korea has comparative advantage in fertilizers, automotive, fish and fish products, gems and jewellery. On the other hand, Korea has comparative disadvantage in chemicals, forest products, medical equipment and instruments, food, oilseeds and oilseed products.

Second, we considered the effects of EVSL on trade flows. By eliminating tariffs, EVSL is expected to increase imports in Korea. Our analysis shows that the increase in imports in terms of volume will be greater in automotive, energy, and chemicals sectors than any others, while automotive, food, fish and fish products sectors will experience a most rapid change in imports in terms of growth rates. At the same time, EVSL is likely to increase Korea's chances for more exports to the member countries as many of them constitute Korea's major trading partners and some still have substantial tariff barriers. We anticipate a substantial increase in automotive exports among other items.

Third, we made use of both the conventional surplus measures and the trade restrictiveness indexes in our welfare analysis. In our estimation of the positive effects on resource allocation of EVSL, food and automotive sectors turned out to have the greatest improvement. Yet the resource allocation improvement is relatively meager in the sectors such as forest products, gems and jewellery, fertilizers, natural and synthetic rubber. Scale and pro-competitive effects are substantial in chemicals, food, automotive, natural and synthetic rubber, whose importance is decreasing in that order.
We also examined the merits of EVSL by comparing the changes in trade restrictiveness indexes during the period between the time (dating back to 4-5 years ago) when the APEC process started and the hypothetical time of implementing the proposals for EVSL. According to our estimation, EVSL is likely to enhance welfare far more substantially than did the liberalization efforts for the past 4-5 years. It will be particularly so in food, fish and fish products, and automotive.

서언
요약

I. 서론

Ⅱ. 조기무역자유화의 대상 및 자유화 현황
1. 조기무역자유화의 대상부문
2. 한국의 대상부문별 관세율 및 비교우위 현황

III. 조기무역자유화의 무역수지 효과
1. 수입증대효과
2. 수출증대효과

IV. 조기무역자유화의 후생 효과
1. 무역자유화의 일반적 효과
2. 완전경쟁하에서의 후생효과 추정
3. 불완전경쟁하에서의 후생효과 추정

V. 무역제한지수의 분석
1. 무역제한지수의 개념
2. 무역제한지수 試算 및 分析

VI. 결론 및 정책시사점

참고문헌

<부록> 조기무역자유화 대상품목의 관세율 및 수출입 현황