Impact of US-China trade war on Thailand's electronic exports

Abstract

This paper aims to examine how US-China trade war impacts on Thailand's electronics industry which is important to Thai economy in term of export. The study uses input-output table to show the connection of Thailand's electronics sector with other industry through its participation in global value chain. Moreover, the study uses a Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model by using the reclassified General Trade Analysis Project (GTAP) database to simulate the results from the set-up scenarios. The results from the simulations show that, overall, Thai economy benefits from US-China trade war in term of both GDP and welfare of the country due to the trade diversion effects. However, the main focus sector of this study, which is electronics sector, will experience export reduction from trade war since Thailand electronics industry is in the midstream or upstream of global value chain which depends much on both US and China market.