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MARCELO ELIZONDO *
There is much talk of the poor historical performance of Argentina's export. The truth is that our country is a country with an external commercial insertion even weaker than many believe.
Recently, the World Bank published information in which, measuring some 150 countries worldwide, badyzes the international trade / GDP relationship and, in particular, exports / GDP in different countries.
With regard to foreign trade in general (exports and imports and goods and services), according to data from the World Bank (WB), the sum of exports and imports of goods and year 2017 is equivalent in Argentina to 25% of GDP. It's one of the lowest ratios in the world. In addition, it is a percentage less than half the world ratio.
In Latin America, our country has a similar result – slightly higher than Brazil (24%); but all other countries in the sub-continent have a higher ratio than the two main Mercosur partners mentioned above.
In general, Latin America and the Caribbean reach a ratio of 43%. According to the World Bank, Argentina is among the countries with the lowest international trade in the world. But beyond integral trade, especially with regard to exports, Argentina has a historically low performance.
However, faced with this reality, the government has reasonably proposed (according to some of its authorities) to increase access to the world through exports of goods and services. One can then wonder what this reaction should be
HIGH LEVELS
The world stage is subject to discursive noises and restrictive actions. On a case-by-case basis, we are witnessing a threat of trade wars and protective and retaliatory measures that affect the scope of action of institutions such as the WTO or international trade treaties. In addition to many changes in international exchange rates and price changes of sensitive products such as the main commodities.
However, world trade grew strongly in 2017 (4.7%, the best percentage for many years). It also expects growth in 2018 (anticipation of 4.4%). And Asia in the first place (Europe in the second) was the main cause of this rise.
In 2017, recently, among the main players in world trade, the two largest stand out, namely China and China. United States, which accounts for a quarter of world trade. And after them appear in a set with good performance the other major economies (among the largest in the world).
And then, and in a third group, there are emerging emerging ones that have become important and important (and significant) elite actors of the top 30 exporting and importing countries on the planet.
By badyzing only exports, it must be said that in 2017, Argentina saw its exports increase by less than 1% (considering the values, because if the volume is badyzed they do not are not even developed.)
This has placed Argentina, according to the World Bank, in one of the countries with the lowest ratio of exports to GDP in the world (the 6th worst). The following list (WTO) shows the 12 countries with the lowest exports / GDP in the world in 2017. Exports of goods and services are considered for this purpose. Argentina, like this, has been the worst result in Latin America (Brazil is not very far in this list).
The ratio of exports to GDP in Latin America and the Caribbean was 20.9% in total. In Latin America, the countries of Central America and the Caribbean have a higher overall ratio (Guyana, 43.7%, Honduras, 43.6%, Nicaragua, 41.2%, Costa Rica, 34.2% , El Salvador, 27.6%,
In South America, the highest ratio was Paraguay, which peaked at 41.8%, followed by Chile (28.7%) and Bolivia (24.7%). , 9%) and Peru (24.3%)., Uruguay (21.6%), Ecuador (20.8%), Colombia (14.8%) and Brazil (12.6%) and Argentina (11.2%) There is no updated data from Venezuela, while Mexico receives an exceptional percentage of 37.9%.
In such a way that we can observe that Argentina maintains a very limited commercial link in relation to its GDP with the rest of the planet.As, moreover, world trade has increased. last year more than the weakness of the Argentine trade, again Argentina lost its participation in this in 2017 (in terms of trade property was 0.33%).
This implies that the ratio of exports to GDP in Argentina is about half that of Uruguay or Peru. In Chile, it is about one and a half times larger than in Argentina, and Paraguay has a higher rate of 273%.
SELL
The question is therefore: if it is decided that Argentina grow in exports, where should you aspire? Argentina exported in 2017 (according to the IMF) 58 427 million dollars of goods. This implies: less than Brazil (US $ 217,768 million exported); less than Mexico (US $ 409,494 million, the historical record); but also less than Chile ($ 68,306 million).
And this implies more than Peru ($ 44,917 million), Colombia ($ 38,780 million), Venezuela ($ 31,600 million), Ecuador (u $ 19,122 million) EU), Paraguay (US $ 8,680 million) and Uruguay (US $ 7,889 million).
If Argentina exports (baduming a comparison with 2017 GDP, estimated in $ 595,000 million), an amount equivalent to the ratio of the region (Latin America) should be 119 billion US dollars in goods (which implies 102% more export.)
Of course, if you want to emulate the ratios of your closest neighbors, you should export a lot more. To tie Chile's ratio, it should sell $ 170,000 million. If you intend to export for the Uruguay report, you should do it in 128,000 million dollars; If you want to match Paraguay, the figure would go very far, to US $ 248,000.
To match Bolivia's ratio, you should export $ 148,000 million (about 150% more). And with Brazil, the difference is smaller (these are the two economies with less exports compared to the GDP of the planet) and is expected to export some 75 billion US dollars (10% more).
CONCLUSION
we can say that if Argentina intends to export more and reach levels compatible with its neighbors, it is still very far from the figures of international commercial relations which would correspond to it reasonably. Argentina is expected to export about $ 120,000 million (just over double) to match the ratio of Latin America.
Argentina, like that, is a country with very limited cross-border trade relations. This generates a lot of problems. At least four: one of them is that he lacks commercial dollars (he also receives little foreign direct investment) which exposes him to greater volatility because that financial dollars acquire greater relative importance than in the rest of the region. The second complication is that its economy is clearly less geared towards higher levels of competitiveness and productivity, as international competition is more business intensive. In addition, it is possible to admit that the economies that export the most generate higher quality jobs, so that Argentina also loses opportunities.
Moreover, in Latin America, the most open economies are the weakest. and, unlike the more closed senses (such as Argentina and Brazil), have higher unemployment rates.
And finally, he can argue that by exporting less, Argentina has less tendency to improve the rate of investment, the domestic rate. and international, as it is proven that economies with the highest levels of foreign direct investment have the largest external commercial integration.
* Director of the consulting firm DNI (International Business Development).
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