Economic liberalization and the vintages of machinery imports in developing countries: an empirical test for India's imports form the United Kingdom

摘要

This paper examines whether India's liberalization of machinery and machine tools since the mid-1980s has led to the use of more recent vintage and/or better quality equipment. empirical tests compare the weight-adjusted unit values of India's imports with those of China, and also of the USA and Germany. Regression analyses use the five-digit and eight-digit SITC data of imports of those countries from the UK. For of three years (1987, 1994 and 1996), India's weight-adjusted unit values were lower than those of the other countries. Further, over that 9-year period, the gap between India's unit values and those of the others did not decrease. A possible explanation is that India's reforms have not yet had sufficient time to have an effect and that this may require thatn enterprises undertake a greater effort to search for more recent vintages and also develop the technological capabilities and skills required for their use.