• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
• /
• v.9 no.10
• /
• pp.29-38
• /
• 2022

Ready-made Garments (RMG) export earnings, which are almost 80% of the total exports of Bangladesh, have been recognized as one of the main catalysts for the recent development of the country. Therefore, the need to determine whether the RMG export had served as a mechanism for increasing the GDP growth as well as the economic development of the country is topical and pressing. We have applied the Johansen Co-integration test and Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) to reveal the linkage of RMG export earnings and other variables with the GDP growth rate in Bangladesh. Using data from 1990 to 2020 for Bangladesh, we have found long-run as well as short-run associations among RMG Export earnings, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), and GDP growth. A co-integration among the variables is validated through the Johansen Co-integration test. Moreover, a causal correlation running from RMG export earnings to GDP was revealed by the Granger causality test in the long run. Finally, we estimated impulse response functions to observe the variations of model variables in response to a shock. Our result supports the proposition that RMG export earnings are one of the main growth engines in Bangladesh and this sector leads growth in other sectors also in the long term.

• Management & Information Systems Review
• /
• v.37 no.2
• /
• pp.87-108
• /
• 2018

This article explores the international trade flow of Bangladesh's ready-made garments (RMG). We first suggest the brief history and an international structure of trade among countries by using the trade volume. Then we implemented a gravity model regression with the sample of 38 major partner countries in order to investigate the potential export market for the RMG industry. The fixed effect and random effect model for the panel data during the period of 1990 to 2011 are estimated. Our result shows that Bangladesh's RMG exports are affected positively by the size of economy, inflation, exchange rate, foreign direct investment(FDI) and trade openness. On the other hand, the distance between trading partners are related negatively with the trade volume. We used the estimated coefficients from the panel regression in order to predict RMG export potential of Bangladesh. This might show which country is the promising export market for Bangladesh RMG industry. We found that Bangladesh has the highest potential of RMG export with Japan and USA, which seem to have considerable room for export growth if trade barriers and constraints are removed. We added some policy implications for encouraging the RMG export of Bangladesh by using the results from the analysis.