Regional Trade and Economic Cooperation in South Asia

Introduction The inability of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to broker a multilateral trading system acceptable to all its members has sparked a rising interest in regionalism. The first wave of regionalism in the 1960s was divided along North-North and South-South trading arrangements. In the 1980s, the second regionalism wave evolved into a North-South trading arrangement. (1) However, in a post-Cold War setting, regional groupings have responded to the volatility of the multilateral trading system by increasing regional cooperation and trade and various trade-driven groupings emerged such as the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA), Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and the European Union (EU). While South Asia has lagged behind other regions in creating a regional trade grouping, the formation of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in 1985 is a step towards this direction. However, for economic and political reasons, SAARC has made relatively slow progress on expanding intraregional trade. The South Asian region contains a range of ethnic groups, religions and languages but governance has often centralized political power among a small elite, creating tensions by discounting the interests of the majority. (2) Various economic explanations have been presented to account for the inability of South Asian countries to trade more with one another. These range from South Asian economies producing similar types of goods, to government interference in economic development through the implementation of import substitution industrialization (ISI) policies and highly regulated economic policies. (3) The diversity of economies in terms of their size and complexities of using preferential trading policies has also contributed to slow intraregional South Asian trade. (4) Although cooperation among SAARC countries was supposed to be based on areas of mutual cooperation, with the exclusion of bilateral and contentious issues, it is the latter that have derailed SAARC meetings. The problem of Kashmir, present since the partition of British India into the Republic of India and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1947, has been one of the main obstacles preventing the SAARC region from achieving its full economic potential as a regional grouping. (5) For example, the postponement of the SAARC Heads of State Summit in 1999 followed renewed tensions between India and Pakistan. Similarly, both countries' preferential imports from each other declined significantly from 1996 to 1998 following the nuclear tests in 1998 and the Kargil conflict in 1999. (6) The way forward for SAARC to achieve greater regional economic cooperation will mean dealing with bilateral and contentious issues such as the Kashmir dispute. This paper attempts to examine the process of rapprochement between India and Pakistan over the divisive issue of Kashmir and what this would mean for SAARC as well as Pakistan's ambitions to strengthen its ties with ASEAN. In this context, political will and a change of mindset is crucial to resolve economic obstacles like the Kashmir dispute if the SAARC region does not wish to fall further behind economically. The changing mindset among South Asia's policy-makers was reflected by India's Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee who pointed out that the increasing economic globalization has been accompanied by the consolidation and emergence of vast new economic groupings (7) such as the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). India being the largest and most influential economy in South Asia has encouraged the economic integration of SAARC by providing greater concessions but the slow progress of a South Asia Preferential Trading Arrangment (SAPTA) has seen a shift in focus towards bilateral trading agreements between SAARC member countries. (8) India has also kept its options open by being willing to conclude bilateral Free Trade Arrangements with those countries within the region intent on moving ahead faster. …

Most of the South Asian countries, namely Bangladesh, Bhutan,1 India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka formed a loose association SARC (South Asian Regional Cooperation) in the year 1980. Through various meetings and conferences spread over five years under the banner of SARC, an agreement was signed in December 1985 for the formation of SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation. SAARC member-countries have chosen some areas of cooperation like, agriculture, rural development, meteorology, telecommunication, scientific and technical cooperation, health and cooperation activities, transport, postal services and sports, arts and culture. The most recent development that has taken place concerns the meeting of Group of Planners on a yearly basis to review the studies made under the aegis of SAARC in the following areas2 (i) Analysis of trade regimes vis-a-vis industrial protection policies of member countries; (ii) Quantification of the benefits of intra-regional trade expansion including transit problems of land-locked countries and mechanism for financing short duration trade imbalances; (iii) Studies to explore the possibilities of joint ventures in agriculture, industry and energy; and (iv) Studies of existing national systems of industrial promotion and regulation including assessment of design and consultancy capabilities and post-harvest technologies. Inspite of these, the subject of cooperation for intra-regional trade expansion still remains outside the SAARC programme. There is little cooperation in the SAARC region in the sphere of trade. Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka (among other Asian countries) are signatories to the Bangkok Agreement under which each member country gives certain preferential treatment to the co-signatories in the field of trade. This Preferential Trade Agreement signed in July 1975, under the auspicies of ESCAP covered multilateral trade cooperation but has made very limited impact on expanding intra-regional trade among the three countries listed above. Apart from this, the SAARC countries are the members of Asian Clearing Union (ACU), set up in 1975, with a limited coverage of membership, transactions and credit facilities in this region. In spite of SAARC countries' participation in two major schemes of multilateral trade cooperation, the region lagged behind the rest of the world in expanding their trade. Over a period of time, the share of intra-regional trade in this region declined in comparison to world trade. The fall in the share of infra-regional trade can also be seen in a relative sense. Thus, the dependence of these countries upon developed countries has increased and foreign trade has failed to act as an engine of growth in this region. The aim of this paper is to examine: (i) Declining export and import growth rates of SAARC countries; (ii) SAARC countries' aggregate exports and imports share in world exports and imports and its burgeoning trade balances', and (iii) Intra-regional exports and imports share of SAARC countries and SAARC share in its total exports and imports to the rest of the world.

THE FORMATION OF THE SOUTH ASIAN ASSOCIATION FOR REGIONAL COOPERATION (SAARC) in December 1985 was hailed as a major diplomatic breakthrough in South Asia. But SAARC's slow progress and modest achievements over the past decade have evoked different reactions among different people. To some, SAARC is merely a talking shop, which can provide nothing more than a lip service to the various issues of peace and development in the region. To others, SAARC may not be a panacea to the region's problems, but its existence has certainly provided an opportunity for the policy makers, administrators, and experts to meet regularly and hold informal dialogues on important bilateral and regional issues. This practice of informalism and behind-the-scenes discussions among the political leaders on various SAARC forums has helped contain many difficult situations in the region and has contributed to the beginning of a confidence-building process in South Asia. Additionally, the ratification of SAARC Preferential Trading Arrangement (SAPTA) by all SAARC members in December 1995 and their decision to create a SAARC Free Trade Area (SAFTA) as early as possible have generated guarded optimism about the relevance of SAARC in promoting regional economic cooperation in South Asia.' Will economic interests drive the South Asian countries toward greater cooperation? If so, what is the potential for the growth of regional economic cooperation in South Asia? Given the decades of mutual hostility and distrust, to what extent will the South Asian countries be able to achieve economic interdependence? The answer to these questions requires a

Journal of South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies Vol. XL, No.3, Spring 2017 Locating the Loopholes of South–South Cooperation in South Asia: Can SAARC Deter Hostilities and Promote Cooperation? Zaglul Haider* Introduction Against the backdrop of growing inequality between the North and the South, and increasing infectivity of cooperation between the two, the importance of cooperation among the Southern developing countries of the world has increased to a significant extent. The strategy of South-South cooperation (SSC) is clearly endorsed by the principles of the United Nations. In the aftermath of increasing poverty, inequality and under development in South Asia, it is an imperative to expand SSC in order to change the condition of more than 1 billion underprivileged people in the region. The Global South in general and the countries of South Asia in particular, lack the managerial capacity to combat the major threats of internal security emanating from within the societies unlike the Western developed societies.1 The limited abilities of these countries to manage the emerging crises independently increase the necessity for SSC. The World Bank report shows that by 2008, South Asia experienced 36% extreme poverty 35 *Zaglul Haider is a Professor of Political Science at the University of Rajshahi. He earned PhD degree in Political Science from Clark Atlanta University, U.S.A. He obtained an L.L.M. from Osgoode Hall Law School. Currently, he is a PhD candidate in law at Osgoode Hall Law School. His book The Changing pattern of Bangladesh Foreign Policy was published by the University Press Limited, Dhaka, in 2006. His articles are published in The Security Dialogue, Asian Survey, The Round Table, Asian and African Studies, African and Asian studies, South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Regional Studies, Asian Profile, the Asiatic Society Journal, Journal of International Relations and in many South Asian academic Journals. 1 Mohammed Ayoob, "Security in the Third World: The Worm about to Turn?" International Affairs 60 (1983-84): 46. 36 where a person is living on $ 1.25.2 Given this scenario, SSC is an imperative for South Asian countries. Meaningful SSC is also important in order to preserve and protect their minimum core values i.e. political independence, territorial integrity, or the security.3 This paper argues that bilateral hostilities between India and most of the South Asian countries and Indian domineering role in South Asia created mistrust and misunderstanding between India and other South Asian countries. The South Asian neighbors consider India as a dominating state, given her political, economic and military power as well as hostile attitude toward them. This power politics of India is primarily responsible for the slow economic cooperation in South Asia. This paper further argues that within the existing Charter of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), where bilateral, political and contentious issues are deliberately denied formal discussion, SSC or regional integration in its fullest capacity is not feasible. Although SAARC emerged as an economic forum, economic cooperation does not work effectively, if deeply rooted political hostilities or rivalries among the partners do exist. Therefore, to promote SSC within the regional framework of SAARC, my approach is to incorporate all bilateral issues under the purview of SAARC. To this end, SAARC Charter needs to be amended. This will not only settle the existing political disputes but also accelerate SSC within the SAARC region. This paper is organized into five sections. Section1 introduces the paper, formulates the arguments, and shapes the structure of the chapter. Section 2 defines SSC, explains the evolution of SSC, rationale for SSC and the justifications for SSC in South Asia. Section 3 focuses on the loopholes of SSC in South Asia which includes political, economic and security challenges that limit the scope of SSC. Section 4 explores if SAARC at all is capable to promote regional economic cooperation and defuse tensions under its present charter. If not, why and how to make SAARC an effective regional instrument. In conclusion I summarize the main findings and recommend some policies for the promotion SSC in the region. 2 World Bank defines extreme poverty as living on $1.25 per day. The World Bank report is cited in Nikhilla Gill, "Extreme...

The renewed and reinvigorated engagement of India with the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) over the past few years has been one of the significant factors leading to the gradual and irreversible transition of the regional organisation from a declaratory phase to one of implementation (Bhagwati, 2008). The new growth momentum in the South Asian region and its increasing openness encourages a fresh look at the economic integration of the region. In this context, the study examines the opportunities and commodity potential of trade between India and the SAARC countries by adopting a variety of trade indices of export intensity index and import intensity index along with Gini coefficient. The authors further study the commodity trade potential between India and the SAARC countries by adopting the revealed comparative advantage index and revealed import dependency index. The study concludes an increasing export intensity and import intensity of trade between India and the other SAARC member countries. Finally, the values of Gravity coefficient and commodity analysis find a high trade potential between them and the untapped trade and investment scenario that could be tapped by strengthening the regional block of SAARC.

PurposeThis paper aims to unravel the impact of post-pandemic COVID-19 on foreign direct investment (FDI) and its determinants in the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Countries.Design/methodology/approachThe study utilized four macroeconomic variables includes growth domestic product growth rate (GDPG), inflation rate (IR), exchange rate (ER), and unemployment rate (UR) to assess their impact on post-pandemic FDI, along with two variables control of corruption (CC) and political stability (PS) to measure the influence of good governance. Random effects, fixed effects, cluster random effects, cluster fixed effects and generalized method of moments (GMM) models were applied to a balanced panel dataset comprising eight SAARC countries over the period 2010–2021. To identify the random trend component in each variable, three renowned unit root tests (Levin, Lin and Chu LLC, Im-Pesaran-Shin IPS and Augmented Dickey-Fuller ADF) were used, and co-integration associations between variables were verified through the Pedroni and Kao approaches. Data analysis was performed using STATA 17 software.FindingsThe major findings revealed that the variables have an order of integration at the first difference I (1). Nonetheless, this situation suggests the possibility of a long-term link between the series. And the main results of the findings show that the coefficients of GDPG, CC and PS are positive and significant in the long run, showing that these variables boosted FDI inflows in the SAARC region as they are significantly positively linked to FDI inflows. Similarly, the coefficients of UR, IR, ER and COVID-19 are negative and significant.Practical implicationsBy identifying the specific impacts of the post-pandemic FDI and its determinants, governments and policymakers can formulate targeted policies and measures to mitigate the adverse effects and enhance investment attractiveness. Additionally, investors can gain a deeper understanding of the risk factors and adapt their strategies accordingly, ensuring resilience and sustainable growth. Finally, this paper adds value to the literature on the post-pandemic impact on FDI inflows in the SAARC region.Originality/valueThis paper is the first attempt to trace the impact of COVID-19 on Foreign Direct Investment and its determinants in the SAARC Countries. Most of the previous studies were analytical in nature and, if empirical, excluded some countries due to the unviability of the data set. This study includes all the SAARC member countries, and all variables' data are completely available. There is still a lack of empirical studies related to the SAARC region; this study attempts to fill the gap.

The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) as a regional economic grouping in South Asia has not emerged as a viable and an efficient regional block such as the European Union (EU) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Despite taking several initiatives in this regard, it has not achieved the desired objectives set forth at the time of its establishment. Over thirty years, it has become hostage to the Pakistan-India adversarial relationship. Through interviews with key informants (KIs), this article investigates the causes for the lack of momentum of SAARC and explores how ASEAN's path might offer lessons for SAARC. Adopting qualitative methods and content analysis this research finds the dominance of the Pakistan-India conflictual relationship as the key reason for the relative weakness of the SAARC. Moreover, the lack of implementation of SAARC declarations, conflicting issues between India and other neighbouring countries and the strict SAARC visa regime are important barriers to the enhancement of regional co-operation in South Asia. The article recommends that SAARC countries follow the ASEAN model and focus on the augmentation of regional cooperation while managing bilateral conflicts between them. In this regard, Pakistan and India, being the largest economies in South Asia, should also perform a role in enhancing bilateral economic cooperation to avoid the potential for bilateral conflict. The article also finds that bilateral economic co-operation between Pakistan and India has a spillover effect on the enhancement of regional economic cooperation in South Asia. Keywords: Regionalism, SAARC, ASEAN, Pakistan-India, regional economic cooperation

During last decade, the stalemate in multilateral trade negotiations under the framework of World Trade Organization (WTO) regime has provided impetus to the signing of regional trade agreements world over .South Asia is not an exception to this trend and has been involved in setting up its own bilateral and Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs). Most commonly cited cooperation agreements are Agreement on Trade and Commerce between India and Bhutan(1972), India-Nepal Bilateral Trade and Transit Treaties(1991), India–Sri Lanka Bilateral Free Trade Area(1998) Bangkok Agreement (1975), Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand Economic Cooperation (BIMST-EC-2004) and the Indian Ocean Rim Association of Regional Cooperation (IOR-ARC-1997). One of the most significant steps towards regional economic cooperation in the history of South Asian countries, was taken with signing of The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) formed in 1985 with the objective of exploiting “accelerated economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region” for the welfare of the peoples of South Asia. And then seven South Asian countries—Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka—initiated a framework for region-wide integration under the South Asian Preferential Trade Agreement (SAPTA) in 1995. In order to further cement the regional economic relations and overcome some impediments of SAPTA, the South Asia Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) was signed in early 2004, which came into force on 1st July 2006. The SAFTA is a parallel initiative to the multilateral trade liberalization commitments of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) member countries. SAFTA aims to reduce tariffs for intraregional trade among the seven SAARC member countries. It has been agreed that for the South Asian countries, Pakistan and India will eliminate all tariffs by 2012, Sri Lanka by 2013 and Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives and Nepal by 2015. The current paper is an attempt in assessing the potential trade in the region with latest dataset with Gravity model approach.

Status of mental health in South Asian countries

Notwithstanding the persevering endeavours of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries to enhance economic cooperation and intra–regional trade, contentions exist amongst analysts on the objective that has remained rather elusive for over two decades. Against this backdrop, this article investigates the impact of trade agreements amongst SAARC countries on intra–regional exports by employing an augmented gravity model and a pooled panel data for the period 1980–2005. Empirical tests find scant evidence of the impact of trade agreements on exports in the pre–SAARC and pre–South Asian Preferential Trading Arrangement (SAPTA) periods, but discern a statistically significant and positive impact in the post–SAARC and post–SAPTA periods. Further tests suggest a clear evidence of trade creation above and beyond the catalytic effect of SAPTA, but only for those countries that have trade agreements in place, while the reverse is true for those that do not have such agreements. Also, the increased exports in the latter half of the period under consideration emanates as a combined effect of SAPTA as well as the delayed impact from the existing bilateral trade agreements amongst the member states.

The world has witnessed formation of several regional economic cooperation in different parts of the world after the World War II The significant success in regional economic cooperation in different parts of the world has been reflected in formation of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) in 1985 among seven countries of South Asia, namely Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. In any regional economic cooperation, trade is a key component SAARC is not exception to this. In 1995, they have established South Asian Preferential Trade Area (SAPTA). The idea of economic interdependence within the South Asian region had gained importance after formation of SAPTA, in particular. In the 8th SAARC Summit in 1995, the member countries have decided to form South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA) by the year 2005. Therefore, a quantitative economic analysis of any national economy within SAARC should allow its trade relation with member countries. In the present paper, we study the quantitative impact of duty free access to India s market for imports on SAARC countries.

Objectives One-fifth of the world’s population lives in eight countries that constitute the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). There is very little coordination among SAARC countries regarding the harmonization of pharmaceutical regulations and medicines safety. Pakistan, India and Bangladesh have experienced medicine-related tragedies where many patients have died. This study aims to examine current pharmacovigilance activity in the SAARC region to improve pharmacovigilance practices and to make recommendations for building a platform for collaboration to improve the safety monitoring of medicines in the region. The current review utilized secondary data. We reviewed the official websites of all SAARC countries’ national regulatory authorities for pharmacovigilance-related information. A data set with eleven pharmacovigilance indicators were gathered and synthesized. Key findings All eight SAARC member countries have pharmacovigilance systems with full membership in the WHO Program for International Drug Monitoring. Out of eleven pharmacovigilance indicators, India met ten; Pakistan, Bangladesh and Bhutan nine; Maldives and Afghanistan seven; Nepal and Sri Lanka five. The SAARC countries do not have a harmonized pharmacovigilance system or centralized database. Due to positioning in different WHO regions, it is proposed to create a consortium on medicine safety among SAARC countries like other regional organizations of the world to strengthen the pharmacovigilance systems and harmonize the pharmacovigilance practices among member countries. Summary To improve the quality of medicines and to strengthen regional medicine safety, the SAARC secretariat should consider forming a technical group of all member countries’ regulatory authorities.

PurposeCoronavirus, also known as COVID-19, has presented an opportunity to set aside traditional regional collaborations and take responsible leadership to overcome difficult times. This paper aims to explore the current COVID-19 vaccination progress and pandemic status for the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries and suggests responsible leadership to combat the COVID-19 pandemic and to think beyond.Design/methodology/approachThis paper offers a viewpoint of the current COVID-19 vaccination among eight SAARC nations. It scrutinises the recent COVID-19 vaccination statistics for the eight South Asian countries based on Web-based analytics and comparative analysis until 28 August 2021.FindingsThis paper calls for collaborative decisions and responsible actions for policymakers in the SAARC countries to deal with the COVID-19 vaccination crisis. When South Asian countries are fraught with the increasing number of populations with COVID-19 cases, deaths and acute shortage of life-saving vaccines, it is time for their national and SAARC leaders to strengthen regional cooperations and initiate collaborative actions. The paper demonstrates that implementing responsible leadership can result in favourable outcomes for individuals, organisations, regions and the world. Moreover, this paper suggests SAARC, through responsible actions, has the potentiality to overcome the current crisis of COVID-19 vaccination and enhance the regional sustainability of the South Asian nations.Originality/valueThis paper delivers information about the present developing situation of COVID-19 vaccination in SAARC countries, how the governments and regional leadership are handling and future challenges that have been raised and can be overcome effectively. This paper can be helpful for the policymakers and SAARC leaders for effective public health interventions in the region and to develop a recovery roadmap for the sustainable economic zone.

Paper deals with the scientometric analysis of research performance of SAARC countries in Library & Information Science. Quantitative research performance of SAARC countries in terms of total documents, citable documents, and non-citable documents has been discussed. Further, citations related data to SAARC countries during 1996-2015 from Scopus database have been analyzed elaborately. Citations per documents, Relative Citation Impact, and h-index have been calculated for SAARC countries during the period. India has been found to be most productive country in LIS research and receiving citations also amongst SAARC countries followed by Pakistan and Bangladesh. Moreover, Nepal, Bhutan, Afghanistan, and Maldives are far behind in research productivity of LIS research amongst SAARC countries.

In terms of South Asian institutions, SAARC is crucial. The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) is a political and economic group in the region. It is founding members-Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Afghanistan-made it the largest regional organization on December 8, 1985. It has played a significant part in fostering closer ties between its member countries by organizing summits and conferences at a variety of levels. India plays a significant role as a SAARC member. Geographically and economically, India controls 70 percent of the SAARC region, while the other six member nations share borders only with India. In this study researcher highlights Indias trade relations with other SAARC economies. Researcher also examines India commercial ties to the other SAARC nations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data used in this article was collected from yearly reports made public by SAARC secretaries, which included numerical data acquired from those reports. The results indicate that during the Covid-19 outbreak, trade between India with the other SAARC members fall. The research indicates that the future has opportunities that are favorable for the progress of nations. KEYWORDS: SAARC Countries, South Asia, Covid-19, SAARC secretaries.