Exporting, R&D and Absorptive Capacity in UK Establishments: Evidence from the 2001 Community Innovation Survey

Richard Ian Harris and Qian Cher Li ()

Working Papers from Department of Economics, University of Glasgow

Abstract: This paper models the determinants of exporting (both export propensity and export intensity), with a particular emphasis on the importance of absorptive capacity and the endogenous link between exporting and R&D. Based on a merged dataset of the 2001 Community Innovation Survey and the 2000 Annual Respondents Database for the UK, our results suggest that alongside other factors, undertaking R&D activities and having greater absorptive capacity (for scientific knowledge, co-operation with international organisations, and organisational structure and HRM practices) significantly reduce entry barriers into export markets, having controlled for selfselectivity into exporting and the endogenous link between exporting and R&D. Nevertheless, conditional on entry, only greater absorptive capacity (for scientific knowledge) seems to further boost export performance in international markets, whereas spending on R&D no longer has an impact on exporting behaviour once we have taken into account its endogenous nature.

Keywords: exports; R&D; absorptive capacity; sample selection (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: L25 R11 R38 (search for similar items in EconPapers)

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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gla:glaewp:2006_19

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