Seafood Export Performance Effects of Industrial Upgrading: Evidence from Namibia’s Industrial Policy

In the reviewed literature, considerable attention has been paid to the relationship between policy intervention and seafood export performance. However, the relationship with respect to an industrial policy targeting the transformation of seafood products within the processing and manufacturing sector has not been investigated as yet. This study attempts to fill this gap. With a balanced panel of 29 countries, this paper investigates the effectiveness of Namibia’s industrialisation policy on processed seafood export outcomes spanning the period 2001 to 2019. The study employed the Difference-in-Difference (DID) methodology and the findings confirm the model’s applicability and the absence of improved export performance before policy intervention. The DID estimation for the full sample suggests policy intervention enhanced processed seafood export outcomes however, the effect cannot be generalised to all export markets and likewise cannot be applicable to Namibia’s export competitiveness in all markets. The empirical findings likewise substantiate that while the intervention enhanced differentiated export outcomes in European markets, regional importers prefer unprocessed seafood. In view of the need to limit the export of unprocessed seafood and enhance the gains from the seafood trade, this study recommends that the intervention should focus on regional market seafood preferences in order to achieve the objectives of the industrialisation policy.在现有综述文献中，学界已对政策干预与海产品出口绩效之间的关联展开了大量探讨。然而，针对加工制造业领域海产品转型升级的产业政策所对应的关联，迄今尚未得到研究。本研究旨在填补这一研究空白。本研究采用涵盖29个国家的平衡面板数据集，考察了2001至2019年间纳米比亚工业化政策对加工海产品出口成效的实施效果。研究采用了双重差分（Difference-in-Difference, DID）方法，实证结果验证了该模型的适用性，同时证实政策干预前出口绩效并未得到提升。全样本的双重差分估计结果显示，政策干预确实提升了加工海产品的出口成效，但该效应无法推广至所有出口市场，同样也无法适用于纳米比亚在所有市场的出口竞争力。实证结果同样证实，尽管该政策干预在欧洲市场提升了差异化出口成果，但区域进口市场更偏好未加工海产品。鉴于限制未加工海产品出口、提升海产品贸易收益的现实需求，本研究建议政策干预应聚焦区域市场的海产品消费偏好，以实现工业化政策的既定目标。