BRICs, an acronym coined by Goldman Sachs refers to the most dynamic emerging economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China. The BRICs’ common features include large territory and population, low income levels but also fast economic growth resulting in the emergence of a prosperous local middle class. Studying the export baskets of these countries we find that beyond the common features that they share, the export baskets of these countries are not similar.
The paper undertakes a comparative study of the qualitative changes in the export structure of BRIC economies for a period from 1993 to 2005 using the Balassa's Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) index.
To make a comparative study of the technological changes in the content of the export basket of the BRIC economies and to compute the RCA index, the exports of manufactured goods are classified into 7 broad categories of technological competitiveness into: Resource Intensive, Labour Intensive, Human Capital Intensive Low Technology, Human Capital Intensive Medium Technology Labour Intensive, Human Capital Intensive Medium Technology Capital Intensive, Human Capital Intensive High Technology Capital Intensive and Human Capital Intensive High Technology Labour Intensive. This detailed classification enables us to identify the qualitative changes which have taken place in the export baskets.
The study finds that Brazil's export basket is still dominated by commodities in Resource intensive & Labour Intensive category. But we can see marginal improvement in the exports of commodities under the Human Capital Intensive Low Technology & Human Capital Intensive Medium Technology Capital Intensive goods category. Russia's advantage is in exports of Resource intensive goods. India's advantage lies in exporting commodities included in the Resource Intensive and Labour Intensive goods. But its export shares in commodities in the category of Human Capital Intensive High Technology Capital Intensive have steadily improved during the period from 1992 to 2003. China continues to have advantage in exporting Labour intensive & Resource intensive commodities. But there is a steady and large improvement in commodities exported under the Human Capital Intensive High Technology Capital Intensive goods and Human Capital intensive Medium Technology Labour Intensive commodities. Among the BRICs, China has climbed up the quality ladder in terms of exporting high technology intensive goods.
Comparative advantage, Exports, Technology
