Are Seminars on Export Promotion Effective? Evidence from a randomized controlled trial

Yu Ri Kim (), Yasuyuki Todo, Daichi Shimamoto and Petr Matous

Discussion papers from Research Institute of Economy, Trade and Industry (RIETI)

Abstract: This paper investigates the impacts of informational and motivational seminars on export promotion targeting small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the traditional apparel and textile clusters in Vietnam. To control for biases due to self-selection, we conducted a randomized controlled trial and invited randomly selected firms to participate in one-day seminars. Because only some of the invited firms participated in the seminars, we employ an instrumental variable approach in which dummies for random invitation are used as instruments for quantifying participation. We find that the seminars had no significant effect on most firms' preparation for, perception of, or engagement in exporting activity. However, the seminars encouraged large firms and firms with prior export experience, which possibly embody higher productivity and absorptive capacity, to (re-)start exporting. Our results suggest that productivity improvement is an effective means to encourage underdeveloped firms to export, whereas provision of information is effective for productive firms.

Pages: 28 pages
Date: 2016-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-int, nep-sea, nep-sog and nep-tra
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

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Journal Article: Are seminars on export promotion effective? Evidence from a randomised controlled trial (2018)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eti:dpaper:16078

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