The Institutional Determinants of Bilateral Trade Patterns

Appendix A. Description of Data

This appendix contains information on the data used in the analysis. First, a description
of the variables used in the analysis is presented, as well as a description of their sources.
Subsequently, we provide a concise overview of these variables and the abbreviations we
assigned to them in our database. Our data set comprised the countries that have been
included in Kaufmann et al. (2001). In each regression run, we included those countries for
which data on relevant indicators could be found or constructed. The starting point for the
data set was that the countries included in the analysis should have data available on the
relevant bilateral trade flows and on some of the institutional indicators. They should be
included in both the WITS database and the database on governance indicators (see below).

Description of the data sources and the relevant variables

For our analysis, we used data on bilateral trade for 1998 from the WITS database,
accessed on courtesy of the Worldbank. The WITS consists of data on exports between
pairs of countries. The figures focus on merchandise trade only. The WITS allows us to
analyse trade patterns on both the aggregate and sector level, the latter in concordance with
1-digit SITC. For now, the analysis has focused on aggregate trade flows.

For information on the level of domestic production, data from the World Development
Indicators (Worldbank 2000, on CD Rom) were used for 1998. Higher production levels
reflect higher aggregate purchasing power and greater export supply, which may positively
affect bilateral trade.

The data for institutional quality were taken from Kaufmann, Kraay and Zoido-Lobaton
(2002), which we also used to construct figures for the bilateral variables reflecting
institutional homogeneity. A further description of the institutional variables has been
included in the main text. We refer the reader to section 3 for this purpose.

The analysis also includes other bilateral variables: geographical distance, common
border, common primary language, common trade agreement, common dominant religion
and common colonial history. These have been collected from diverse sources, such as
Sala-i-Martin (1997) for religions and colonial backgrounds. The database is available upon
request with the corresponding author.

Bilateral Trade Flows and Institutions

<<   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   >>

More intriguing information