Per Botolf Maurseth

Utenlandsinvesteringer i sjømatnæringen og norsk tilknytning til EU

This chapter discusses foreign direct investments in the seafood industry and the Norwegian relationship with the EU. While ownership in harvesting is mainly national, the aguaculture industry is characterised by multinational firms. Norway and many EU countries alike, have regulations that limit foreign ownership in harvesting. There is no such regulations in processing or in aquaculture. Alternative trade agreements between Norway and the EU may influence on foreign direct investments in the fishery industries.

Internet use, intermediaries and international trade

This study of the relationship between internet use and international trade finds that firms in many developing countries are more likely to engage in export and/or import if they use the internet as a communication tool. An ordered probit regression indicates that internet use is positively associated with direct participation in trade, as well as with indirect participation via trade intermediaries. Data on countries’ aggregate trade do not give support for the micro-findings, however: no significant association emerges between the share of internet users in a given country and that country's openness to trade.

Globalization of intellectual property rights

Recent decades have witnessed a strong globalization process. This has been so for international trade and international capital markets, but also in the field of Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs). IPRs were formerly in the domains of nation states. International treaties have dictated convergence in IPR institutions across the world. This paper gives a short overview of these developments. Incentives for IPRs are stronger for more innovative countries. Therefore, innovative countries traditionally had stronger IPR than less innovative countries. A negotiated global treatment (like the TRIPS agreement) is likely to be a compromise between the needs in innovative and less innovative countries. Such agreements may therefore be complemented with additional agreements among innovative countries. The European Patent Office (EPO), and the planned European unitary patent are examples. IPRs are also incorporated into new preferential trade agreements. Many believe that this trend will result in convergence of stronger IPRs across countries, to the benefit of innovative countries, but at the cost of less innovative countries.

ICT, growth and happiness

This paper reviews two strands of literature. The first is on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and growth. The increasing role of ICTs came together with stagnating growth rates in many countries. This has been denoted the Solow paradox. During the dot-com era from the mid-1990s, many believed that the paradox was solved. Growth rates increased and the internet became pervasive. The great recession has been followed by lower growth in Europe and in the United States and a return of the Solow paradox. Evidence indicates that the share of internet users in a population had a positive effect of growth in the 1990s, but that this effect vanished for developed countries after 2000. The second strand of literature is a heterogeneous research tradition that relates ICT not to income and growth, but to human well-being. That literature indicates positive (as well as some negative) effects of ICT and the internet on people’s happiness. Some new evidence indicate that the share of internet users in populations in a panel of countries is positively related to average happiness.

Market-specific Sunk Export Costs: The Impact of Learning and Spillovers

Firms may face sunk costs when entering an export market. Previous studies have focused on global or country-specific sunk export costs. This study analyses the importance of market-specific sunk export costs (defining ‘market’ as a product–country combination). We also study how market-specific export costs can be affected by various kinds of learning and spillover effects. We use firm-level panel data for Norwegian seafood exports distributed on products and countries. The results lend support to the hypothesis of market-specific sunk costs. We also find evidence of learning and spillover effects, particularly within the same product group.

Norway and the BRICS (III): Trade, Ivestments and Opportunities

Frihandelsavtalen mellom EU og Canada : Virkninger for Norge og norsk eksport av fisk

I 2016 er det ventet at ferdigforhandlet frihandelsavtale mellom EU og Canada vil tre i kraft. Avtalen innebærer at de fleste tollsatser mellom EU og Canada fjernes. Det tas også sikte på å redusere andre handelshindre. Den samlede utenrikshandelen til EU og Canada representerer om lag 34 prosent av den totale verdenshandelen. Handelen mellom EU og Canada er mindre og representerer 0.25 prosent av verdens totale handel. Avtalen er likevel viktig og den er ventet å øke handelen mellom EU og Canada. Avtalen får også virkninger for andre land. En virkning av frihandelsavtaler er handelsvridning. Import fra tredjeland erstattes av import fra avtalepartnerne. For Norge kan dette være av betydning siden Norge i utgangspunktet har frihandelsavtaler både med EU og Canada. Norges handelspreferanser i EU og Canada blir mindre med frihandelsavtale mellom EU og Canada.I notatet beregnes slike virkninger for Norges eksport til EU og til Canada. Virkningene på norsk eksport avhenger av handelshindrene iutgangspunktet og av markedsandelen til henholdsvis EU i canadiske markeder og Canada i europeiske markeder. De samlede virkningene av frihandelsavtalen mellom EU og Canada beregnes å være små. Men for enkelte varer og varetyper kan virkningene være betydelige.

Transatlantisk frihandel og Norge

Forhandlingene om et handels- og investeringspartnerskap (TTIP) mellom EU og USA er svært ambisiøse og har som mål å fjerne tollbarrierer samt en rekke regulatoriske hindringer mellom de to partene. Avtalen er ment å dekke handel i både varer og tjenester samt investeringer. I rapporten analyserer vi konsekvensene av et TTIP for Norge. Vi ser også på konsekvenser av en egen handels- og investeringsavtale mellom Norge og USA.