AN ESTIMATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONTAINER SHIPPING TRANSPORT VOLUMES AMONG ASIAN COUNRTIES BY GLOBAL TRADE ANALYSIS PROJECT MODEL AND ITS APPLICATIONS TO FTA AND TRANSPORT IMPROVEMENT SCENARIOS

Abstract

While the regional economy integration has recently attracted much interest, its impact on the rapidly developing international marine transport industry is a major concern. This paper proposes a method for estimating the international container cargo OD flows under various hypothetical FTA memberships and transport technical progress by incorporating the GTAP model, which uses the applied general equilibrium theory to conduct the quantitative analyses of international trade issues. The effects under the FTA scenarios and transport technical progress scenarios on the selected countries' economy, social welfare, trade amounts and container OD flows are discussed. Since this method provides an approach for estimating the OD flows on a national wide level, it can be utilized for assessing the policy effects on international trade and transportation. Therefore, it is also an important step for demand forecasting such as the volume of container handling and transshipment on the international container shipping transport networks.