IS MALAYSIA TOO DEPENDENT ON INTERNATIONAL TRADE? Ahmed Munawar: Siti Hajar Mohmed Noorhayati Md. Daud Raz Izyantie Wahezar Rahman - 1 -
Contents INTRODUCTION... 3 METHODOLOGY... 4 PART A: ANALYSIS OF TRADE PATTERNS OF EXPORTS AND IMPORTS OF GOODS... 5 The percentage of total export and total import to the GDP... 5 The positive correlation between export and GDP... 5 PART B: DIRECTION OF TRADE... 10 1. Advantages that can be gain of being dependant on few important markets... 14 2. Disadvantages that are faced of being dependant on few important markets... 16 PART C: COMPARISON OF DEPENDENCY WITH OTHER COUNTRIES... 17 1. Dependency by exports and imports... 17 Exports by products classifications... 18 Imports by economic classification... 20 2. Dependency by foreign direct investment... 20 PART D: ANALYSIS OF FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT OF MALAYSIA... 22 CHALLENGES FACED BY MALAYSIA TRADE... 25 SOME OF THE MAIN GOVERNMENT POLICIES... 29 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS... 35 RECOMMENDATIONS... 36 REFERENCES... 39-2 -
INTRODUCTION Malaysia is one of the fastest growing economies in the World. Even after the 1997 crisis, Malaysia s economy continued to grow which by the end of 1999 recorded a growth rate of more than 4 per cent, following negative growth in 1998, and in many ways, a Third World success story. More than three decades of sustained growth and structural diversification have reduced the economy s reliance on two main primary products, rubber and tin. The last two decades observed a structural shift in the Malaysian economy - from a primary commodity trading and import substitution - based economy to a highly diversified and export - led economy. The manufacturing and service sectors had become the major GDP contributors with each accounting 33% and 42% of the GDP respectively in 1995. The contribution of agriculture and forestry sectors declined from 29% in 1970 to about 13% during the said period. By 1995, the manufacturing sector accounted nearly 80% of the country s export. The share of commodity sector (palm oil, cocoa, rubber, etc) has declined from 75% (1980) to 20%. Electrical and electronic machinery and appliances are the predominant component of manufactured exports - accounting about half of the export. Its share continued to increase where it reached two-thirds in 1995. The share of other manufactured products - like wood, rubber, chemical, petroleum, iron and steel has remained constant, although, in volume terms, they have registered increases Today, Malaysia is one of the largest manufacturers of semi-conductors and electronic and electrical products. In the mid 1990s, more than 30 per cent of its electronic products were exported to the US. In 1997, the manufacturing sector accounted for about 34 per cent of GDP compared to 12.7 per cent by the agricultural sector. In 1997, the manufacturing sector contributed about 12.5 per cent to GDP growth relative to 1.3 per cent by the agricultural sector (Bank Negara, 1998). In fact, manufactured goods accounted for 73.7 per cent of total Malaysian exports in 1997, suggesting an export-oriented industrialization.. Malaysia is a trading nation, with exports and foreign direct investment playing an important role in its economy. The recent sharp slowdown in the U.S. economy, and Japan's further weakening, - 3 -
pose major challenges for Malaysia's trade and investment outlook and thus to Malaysia's shortand medium-term economic prospects. Indeed, the Central Bank predicts that growth will fall to between 5% and 6% in 2001, mainly due to the slowdown in exports to the United States (the Asian Development Bank has forecast growth of 4.9% in 2001), notwithstanding simulative fiscal measures adopted in March 2001. This raises the question of whether Malaysia's economic policy has perhaps over-emphasized exports at the expense of domestic demand (i.e. national saving is excessive), making it too dependent on foreign markets (and a narrow range of products, namely electronics). METHODOLOGY In our project we have looked into the issue of dependency of international trade for Malaysian growth in three main categories. Firstly by showing the trend in the exports and imports over the period in relation to GDP and seeing how its composition has changed over the period. Next we looked into the direction of trade, where the exports and imports and going to and by analyzing the market structure for Malaysian economy. Thirdly, we compared with one of the ASIAN member country, namely Thailand and also we looked a briefly into Korean economy to see how these economies were doing in terms of dependence on the international trade for growth. In the latter part we have looked into some key issue like FDI, challenges faced by Malaysian economy because of the pattern of trade and we also looked into some policy measures undertaken by the government to deal with the issues in hand. The two countries Thailand and Korea has been considered for comparison after looking into there industry structure and economic performance. Both countries started there development almost same duration that of Malaysia, and has undergone a similar trend in the economic direction. They almost have similar economic resources and know how, but Korea still seems far ahead in some areas than Thailand or even Malaysia. The other base was to select one country from ASIAN region and one from the so called Tiger economic of Asia. For the first, we selected Thailand, and for the latter we chose Korea. - 4 -
PART A: ANALYSIS OF TRADE PATTERNS OF EXPORTS AND IMPORTS OF GOODS To see whether Malaysia is too depended on international trade, here we will analyze the trade pattern, to see the trends in the import and export for Malaysia over the last ten years in comparisons with the GDP for the economy. The percentage of total export and total import to the GDP (Figure A 1.0) Based on, Figure A1.0, we can see that the percentage of total export and total import to total GDP is high and increasing over the years. During 1990s the percentage of export to GDP is more than 100 % in most the time, except for 1997. While the percentage of total import, though it less than 100% after mid 1990s, the proportion in still relatively higher with regard to GDP. This shows that we depend on export and import (i.e..international trade), for income and growth. The positive correlation between export and GDP After testing the correlation between export and GDP and import and GDP, we found that both export and import are positively correlated with GDP. For the period of 1981 to 2001, the correlations are 0.941721 for export-gdp and 0.921928 for import-gdp. If we compare the movement of export to the GDP in Figure A 1.1, we will find that most of the time, they are moving in the same direction except for 1989 and 1991, where their correlations are negative during these two years. After 1991, the correlations between these variable are positively higher (0.970566 and 0.987523 during 1991-2001 compared to 0.816641 and 0.640661 during 1981-1990 for export-gdp and import-gdp), where they are moving in the same way at most of the time. This positive correlation between export-gdp and import-gdp implies that any increase or decrease in export and import can cause the GDP to also increase or decrease. This means that the value of Malaysia GDP is influenced and strongly related to export and import (international trade). - 5 -
Implications of having a high percentage of Exports to GDP a. Strengths Higher export helps us to strengthen the current account in the balance of payments account. The increasing trade balance offset the deficit caused by services balance in the current account. As the services balance in the current account is always in deficit, which is increasing over the years, we need higher trade balance to offset this deficit to strengthen the current account. This can only be achieved if we had a higher and increasing export. According to Figure A 1.2 we found that during the periods when exports are relatively high (higher trade surplus), the current account balance was relatively strong. This was because the deficit in services account can be compensated by the larger amount of trade surplus. Moreover, by looking at Figure A1.3, we will find that there are positive correlation between trade balance and current account balance, where both are moving in the same direction throughout 1981 to 2001. During the period of (except for 1991-92, 1996, 1998 and 2000), the strength and weakness of the current account balance are determined by the trade balance. b. Weaknesses In contrast to the strengths, the relationship between trade balance (and export) and current account balance also has its own downside. Since they are positively related at most of the time, any contraction in exports or trade balance can give bad impact to the current account balance. This was proven when the current account balance felt due to the reduction in trade balance during 1987-90, 1993-95 and 2001. At the same time, our dependency on international trade also exposes Malaysian economy to the external economic conditions. In this case, anything that occurs internationally such as economic slump will affect Malaysian economy directly. This was the case when GDP felt by almost -30% following the trade deficit of RM6334 million in 1991. - 6 -
Within our dependency on international trade, we found few characteristic attributed by this dependency. They are: I. The concentration of export earning to manufactured export. In this case, referring to Figure A1.5, we can see that the amount of manufactured goods that being exported for the period of 1990-99 are very high. Its proportion to the total exports (Figure A1.6) increased from 59 percent in 1990 to 85 percent in 1999. This shows that the main contributor to our export earnings is manufactured export. Within this context, we depend on electronics and electrical (E&E) products that encounters for about more than 50 percent of gross export in 1985, 1990 and 1995. While for other products, their portions are less than 15 percent for the period of 1880 to 1995, and most are decreasing in numbers as well as proportions. The increasing amount of electronic and electrical goods being exported throughout the period shows that we depend on this product for our foreign exchange earnings. (Table A1.0) Implications of having high concentration of export earning to manufactured export a. Strength The increasing role of manufactured export can reduce our dependency on primary export which is elastic in nature. By reducing its dependency on primary commodity export, Malaysia can avoid the risk of fluctuation in commodity export prices. At the same time, it enables us to react to the exchange rate changes, where we can effort to increase the amount of our export when the there is increase in external demand due to the increase in our competitiveness during the period of weaker ringgit. This is because by relying on manufactured goods for our export, we can easily react (increase export volume) when the demand for it increases due to cheaper price when ringgit depreciates against the importer s currency and vice versa. Based on Figure A1.7, we can see that after ringgit depreciated, the volume of commodities that are being exported did not increase. Instead, the volume of tin export dropped sharply, while - 7 -
others are relatively stable. Since the primary exports are not that flexible, the focus on manufactured exports can give us this advantage. Besides that, our focus on manufactured export also contributes to the diversification of export products for Malaysia. This diversification is important, since any downturn in one type of export can be offset by other export. In other words, when the economic condition and global demand do not favor primary goods or its price fall and hurt export earnings, this situation can be compensated by the other. For example, when the export value for rubber and crude oil felt by -12.4% and -10.3% in 1992, our export still able to grew by 17% in that year. In 1999, the declined in export value of agricultural commodities due to weaker price was offset by the increase in the export value of manufactured goods. As a result, we manage to earn even higher export earnings of RM321560 Mill in 1999 compared to RM286563 Mill in 1998 or 16% increase (BNM report 1999).By depending on manufactured export therefore, can help Malaysia to reduce the risk caused by the volatility of commodity prices. b. Weaknesses The higher growth rate in manufactured export and its prospect may affect the primary export. From Table A1.1, we can see that throughout 1985 to 1995, the share of primary exports to total export are decreasing from 57% in 1985 and 40.1% in 1990 to only about 18.9% in 1995, while the share of manufactured exports to total export are rising from 32% and 59.3% in 1985 and 1990 to almost 80% in 1995 (5 th Malaysia Plan). In 1999, its share amounted to 85%, reflecting the further contraction in the share of primary export (Table A1.1). This situation can hurt our export earnings during the periods when there is surplus of manufactured goods in the world market. In the year 1996 for example, the increased in global competition and declined in price of memory chips for electronic and electrical has caused the rate of increase in export and import to be relatively lower as per 1995 increased (from 20% in 1995 to 6.5% in 1996). The export performance is worsened since the amount of electronic and electrical export represented more than 50 percent of the total export for 1995-96 (BNM report, 1996). - 8 -
II. Depend on import for export The dependency of Malaysia export to import content reflected through the positive correlation (0.986) between import and export. The line graph in Figure A1.2 explain this relationship when most of the time, both export and import moved in the same direction, while the growth rate both are increasing during the period, except for the early 1980s and late 1990s where the growth for import contracted compared to the growth in export, and for the late 1980s where export growth felt, while import growth increased (Figure A1.4). However, these situations cannot counter the fact that export and import are directly related. This is because, the drop in import growth in early 1980s is due to the reduction in development expenditure by the government, while in the late 1990s, it is caused by the contraction in import that caused by the reduction in the volume (esp. capital goods as the domestic demand felt) as well as the postponement of big and less important projects by the government (BNM). Implications of Dependant on import for export a. Strength The strength of our dependency on import relies on the fact that both intermediate and investment goods are essential to the production activity. Even if imports exceed exports, it is not necessarily a bad thing if imports were used to increase the nation s productive capability (Pang 1996). This is because without these goods, we cannot produce the final products. Even if we can, without the intermediate and investment goods, we won t be able to produce it efficiently. By referring to figure 6, we will notice that the proportion of intermediate good being imported for manufacturing is almost 50% of the manufactured export. This reflects the importance of import to our export. b. Weaknesses However, this situation of higher import content of export is unfavorable to the trade balance. According to line graph in Figure A2.2, since both export and import keep on increasing, while both of them are very high, it results to a lower trade balance. Besides that, too much dependent on import for export may result to the contraction of foreign exchange earnings earned through export. This is because the payments that have to be made for - 9 -
import may offset our export earnings and affect the income earned through export. In this case, if our export is less than import or slightly higher than import, we will left with only smaller, or even negative income. In addition, higher import content of export makes it difficult for Malaysia to benefit from weaker ringgit, since the increase in import price (when ringgit depreciates) constraint us from reducing our export price. As a result, instead of declines, our export price may increase or a least being unchanged due to the increase in the production cost. PART B: DIRECTION OF TRADE Over the last 30 years, our international trade had been increasing in both export and import and Malaysia is too dependent on few countries for international trade. Among Malaysia traditional partners is US, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, EU, Singapore and Thailand but Malaysia major trading partners are US, Japan, Singapore and EU. And these four partners accounted for 56% of Malaysia s total trade in 2000. From the Table B1.0 we can see that Malaysia are overly dependent on the US and Japan. Our total trades with US keep increasing from year 1985 to 2000 (from 14% (1985) to 17% (1990) to 18% (1995) to 19% (2000)). From 1982 to 2000 our trade account with US mostly had a positive balance (surplus) with the rapid increase in the export sector except in early 1980s (in 1982 deficit of USD 782 million, in 1983 deficit of USD 263 million and 1984 deficit of USD 64 million). From the Table B1.3 shows that 76.8% total export to US is from electrical and an electronics product which is almost 53% of Malaysia total export. From here we can also said that Malaysia is also too dependent on electrical and electronics products for international trade since US is the largest market for electrical and electronics exports and this percentage is keep increasing from the last year which is 77.4%. The increase was attributed to increase investment in new technology, rapid technological innovation and the growing usage of the internet by businesses and consumers in the US. 1 Malaysia was the seventh largest sources of electrical and electronics products for the US with a share of 6.5% followed by Japan, Mexico, PRC, Canada and Republic of Korea. US also remained as the main export market for Malaysia s textiles and apparel amounted 31.2% of Malaysia total export for year 2000 and valued at RM 3.2 billion compared to RM 3 billion in 1999. 1 MITI 2000, pg. 23-10 -
By year 2000, US remained the largest trading partner and replacing Japan which was the largest one from 1980. As we can see from the Table B1.0, in 2000 Malaysia total trade with US is 19% compared to Japan which is 17% compared in 1995 which shows that our total trade with Japan is 20% but with US only 18%. The reason behind this is because of depreciation in Yen that result our import to Japan decreasing. As in the case of trading with Japan we can see from the Table B1.0 that our trade balance with them almost had a negative balance (deficit) with the rapid increase in the import sector except in mid and late 1980s (in 1984 surplus of USD 78 million, in 1985 surplus of USD 951 million, in 1986 surplus of USD 1036 million and in 1987 surplus of 754 million). The largest deficit that we face is in 1995 which is USD 11980 million. This shows that we are importing more than our exporting which does not give us good feeling about the international trade. From the Table B1.4 shows that 49.5% total export to Japan is from electrical and an electronics product which is almost 25% of Malaysia total export in 2000. The increase was due largely to a sustained demand for IT products for example personal computers and the introduction of digital broadcasting. 2 Malaysia maintained the position as the forth largest supplier of integrated circuit (ICs) to Japan after US, Taiwan and Republic of Korea. Same situation as US, we also can also say that Malaysia is dependent on electrical and electronics for international trade in 2000 after the rubber products that we are exporting to Japan. In term of international trade, Japan is the third largest export destination market after US and Singapore in 2000. Our export grew by 29.1% to RM 48.7 billion while import grew by 27.3% to RM 65.9 billion. 3 As we can see from the GRAPH B1.4 and Table B1.0 attached, our export to Japan start to decrease from late 1980s as our export to US increasing. Compared with percentage of import, we can see it start to increase from late 1980s but start to decrease after mid 1990s. As we compared to other countries such as Thailand and Korea we can see that there are also depending on few markets and their main market are the same with us which is US and Japan (refer to Table B1.1 & Table B1.2). In case of Thailand their trades balance with US is positive 2 MITI 2000, pg. 28 3 MITI 2000, pg. 28-11 -
balance (surplus) with the rapid increase in the export sector except in early 1980s where they have been deficit of USD 263 million in 1982, deficit of USD 346 million in 1983, deficit of USD 136 in 1984 and the largest surplus they attained in 2000 which are amounted to USD 8043 million (refer Table B1.1). Looking at Thailand trade balance with Japan we can see that they are having almost negative balance except in 1988 where they faced with surplus of USD 644 but the largest deficit between Thailand and Japan is on 1995 which is amounted to USD 12148 million. From the GRAPH B 1.2 & B1.3, we can see that Thailand are exporting more to US but importing more from Japan. Among the product that they are commonly export to US is integrated circuit (ICs) which is 40.8% of their total export followed by electronics component which is 34% in 1999. 4 In 2000, Thailand are exporting more manufacturing, agriculture and agro industrial product to their main market. Thailand export to US increasing from late 1980s but due to the economic crisis the percentage start to decline, but after that they manage to increase their export back. Their import to US is higher from late 1980s until late 1990s where it started to decrease. Compared with Thailand export to Japan, from Table B1.1 and GRAPH B 1.2 we can see that after the economic crisis in 1997 and 1998 the percentage is decreasing but Thailand import to Japan is at a good condition in early 1990s but start to decline in late 1990s. Thailand prime export destination to US, ASEAN, EU and Japan fell by 10.7%, 6.4%, 4.1% and 1.2% but export to emerging markets in South Asia, South America and Middle East grew substantially in 2000 and shrank in 2001 but export to Africa rose by 15.5% due to a 60% increase in rice export to Nigeria while export to Eastern Europe steeped up only slightly by 2.6%. 5 When we referred to Korea (refer Table B 1.2), we can see that their trade balance with US almost balance between positive and negative throughout these 20 years from 1982 to 2000. Thailand face with deficit with US in 1991, 1992, 1994, 1995, 1996 and 1997 and the largest deficit is in 1996 which is USD 11538 million but their highest surplus is in year 1987 which amounted to USD 9621 million. As their trade balance with Japan, they had a negative balance (deficit) through out this 20 years and the greatest deficit they attained is in year 1995 which amounted to USD 15509 million. 4 Bank of Thailand 5 Bank of Thailand - 12 -
Among Korea main export product to US and Japan is electrical and electronics but the percentage have been decreasing by 22.8% compared to 2002 due to fall in the price of semiconductors and the inactivity of the world information technology industry. Korea import also decreased due to lower demand for raw materials caused by the inactive domestic business conditions and export decrease, the import in the electronics industry sector amounted only to USD 35.5 billion showing a decrease of 19.2% compared to 2002. 6 As we can see from the Graph B1.0, Korea export to US is in the good condition in early 1980s but as years pass by it start to decline and their export to US only increasing after the economic crisis in late 1990s. Looking at their import with US Graph B1.1 shows that the percentage is between 20% to 25% from early 1980 but in year 2000 Korea import to US start to declining below 20% of their total import in that year. As their export with Japan is concerned the percentage is between 15% to 21% in 1980s but it start to decline below 10% of their total export in 1990s but they managed to increased it back in 2000 which is 12% of their total export. Korea export to Japan also increasing in early 1980s but start to decline in mid 1980s until late 1990s but same situation as their export, they managed to increase their import after the economic crisis. By referring to the in Bank of Korea, it shows that they are exporting more electrical and electronics products to this two main market which is transmission apparatus incorporating reception appliances, digital products, vehicle, spark-ignition engine and many others electronics product. In 1998, Korea export of transistor to US is 22.8% of their total export which is among the highest percentage of export to Korea. As we can see from Graph B1.6, Korea is exporting more to US in 1980s compared to Malaysia and Thailand before their export start to decline in early 1990s. Due to their declining in export to US we can see that both Malaysia and Thailand export to US is increasing almost at the same level. In term of importing to US (refer Graph B1.7), still Korea is leading but Thailand import to US is the smallest percentage compared to others Korea and Malaysia is in the range of 10% to 15% of their total import. 6 Bank of Korea - 13 -
Looking at export to Japan, Graph B1.8 & Graph B1.9 shows that Malaysia conquered the market in early 1980s but the situation change in early 1990s when Japan preferring to Thailand products and start to importing less from Malaysia. Same situation is applied in the case of import to Japan whereby Thailand products conquered the market followed by Malaysia. As of Malaysia we can see our import start to decline after mid 1990s but we managed to recover and increase the percentage after the economic crisis. 1. Advantages that can be gain of being dependant on few important markets As far as the discussion is concern, too dependent on international trade also give us some advantages. Since US and Japan is the main market for the world, as they keep developing their demand for import goods will also increasing. Therefore we can always increase our production in order to fulfill their higher demand. Malaysia is not the only country that dependent on US and Japan but almost all countries in the world. Therefore it is not a big problem to us for being dependence. As we know US is a big country with a higher population. Their domestic demand also higher that might result their domestic supplier unable to provide everything and satisfy every individual needs. This will result them with the need of external supplier to maximize the satisfaction of their citizen which Malaysia can play a role by being a supplier to them. As mentioned above, by referring to tables and graphs attached we can see that as our exports to US keep increasing we can gain benefit since the value of Dollar is higher. When US doing internal trade with us, they will pay by using US Dollar and therefore we can bring a lot of profit inflows from outside. Since we are also dealing with other big market such as Japan, logically as our export increase our profit will also follow the same. By being a supplier to this two main market it can also being one ways of attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to Malaysia. Since they are using our products this can make them become interested to know our countries which managed to fulfill their demand. As a result they will come here and try to established their own company or corporation since from the product that we are exporting give a perception to them that Malaysia is one of developing countries that going to have a good future in the economy and maybe we will manage to give an impact to the - 14 -
international trade. Through FDI, the foreign company will create a new job scope to Malaysia citizens. Therefore by increasing FDI indirectly can help us to increase the employment rate. Another benefit that we mange to get by depending on this international trade, is where we can increase our productivity. As we know, we are not the only country that having international trade with US and Japan that result Malaysia to compete with other countries such as Thailand, Korea, Singapore, EU and many other countries. If other countries for example Thailand and Korea manage to produce a higher quality product with a lowest cost will be one of advantages for them. This two main market will change their trading from Malaysia products to Thailand product because their price is much lower and the quality of the products produce is very good. Therefore in order for Malaysia to maintain a good percentage or even increasing our rate of trading with US and Japan, we have to make more research and development (R&D) in certain areas. Through R&D program, we will try to increase our knowledge about the products that will satisfy the demand of US and Japan residents. But that s not all since through R&D also we our self can benefit in the future from the result of the research. We will manage to know on which area we are not performing the best and result us to find a ways to overcome it. Malaysia also will try to produce a good product with higher quality in order to compete with Thailand through the result of R&D. Indirectly, these programs will also creating many job opportunities since we need professionals person to perform the research on certain areas. In the present time, the government is giving more emphasize to conduct more research and the universities also are offering many new courses for example biotechnology. As we know that at US this technology have being use many year earlier than us, therefore it will be a good step for Malaysia to follow the same. As we have graduate from such specific areas, our process of R&D will be much easier rather than delegate this R&D program to someone who does not have any qualification or even any knowledge about those area. Malaysia will also have considerable advantage; if we can develop new technologies in industries we have expertise knowledge (like Palm oil industry) so that we can be as a pioneer in certain areas. If we are able to manage and perform well in those new areas, it will result other country to become interested to do the same. Therefore, they will send their delegation or engineers to Malaysia in order to learn our knowledge in the industry, and this indirectly will give Malaysia - 15 -
good reputation. We also can increase students and other researchers who will be eager to learn the new technology and they will come to Malaysia and to study how we are processing and producing the good. Maybe we also can share our new technology with other countries since they want to learn form us and we can also learn their technology. 2. Disadvantages that are faced of being dependant on few important markets Being dependence to US and Japan not only give us advantages but there are also some weaknesses of doing so. As we know our export and import is targeted on few markets and if those market face any economic downturn it will result us of having a dramatic impact on the whole economy as well. Just as a growing economy benefits most of the individuals who participate in it, a shrinking economy may also hurts individuals. When US or Japan are in the recession their demand to the imported goods will decrease and since we are exporting to them we can also being effected. This is the big problem of being too dependent on them. During their recovery stage, they will try their best to control the market and make sure their outflows of money are increasing since they need the money to overcome their problems. This situation will result them to pull back their FDI which that have given to Malaysia. The reason behind this is because they have to make sure and stabilize their main company or headquarters in their own country in order to make sure they can save their company from being effected more worsen. As a result they will sell their company at Malaysia and we will be at loss of good foreign companies as well as further technological transfer since they return back to their country. (This is a remote case of a large company in most cases.) Another disadvantage of being dependence on few markets is that we have to compete with other countries such as Thailand and Korea who are also producing and exporting same goods to similar countries. This has caused major problems for Malaysian economy over the years to increase the production of those products. For example nowadays, we are quite competitive with Thailand as we know their labor cost is much cheaper than us that the market price of their product is much lower compared to us. This will make US and Japan to buy the product form Thailand instead of Malaysia since the price of our products is much higher. In the case of Korea, their products are of high quality than that of Malaysia. Their product quality is much advance from Malaysia and this had resulted, US and Japan to buy from them. - 16 -
Other than reason mentioned above, we also cannot increase our product base to of these goods to cater for local needs since we are producing and exporting product based on the demand of the citizens of other countries. Therefore we have to produce a good that only can satisfy their demand. We cannot be produce other things since they may not like it or even consume it. Therefore this will limited our creativeness in creating something new for our own needs. PART C: COMPARISON OF DEPENDENCY WITH OTHER COUNTRIES The fact that Malaysia is very reliable on the international trade has been proven before by observing through the significant high percentage of the export and import as the total amount of Malaysia s Gross Domestic Product (GDP). For the purpose to see whether conditions of Malaysia s dependency will give a significant difference between Malaysia over the other countries, Thailand and Korea has been taken to make a comparison with the Malaysia. 1. Dependency by exports and imports a. Malaysia Refer to Table C 1.0 in the appendix, Malaysia has a very high percentage of export and import over the total amount of GDP with almost 26 percent over the total amount of GDP in 1981 and has been increasing year by year to 41 percent over the total amount of GDP in 1990. As time goes by, the percentage of export in Malaysia has been increasing to more than 100% percent in 2000. Meanwhile, the import of Malaysia also recorded a high percentage with 25 percent over the total amount of GDP in 1981 and has been increasing in 1990 to 41 percent over the total amount of GDP. This situation is continuing in 2000 that the import in 2000 also recorded a high percentage with percent over the GDP.( Refer to Table A 1.0) Driving largely by growth by the manufactured products, mostly electric and electronic products, the volume of Malaysian exports is now nearly three times as high as a percentage of GDP as 25 years ago. Thus, this can be the strong evidence of the condition that Malaysia is dependent on the international trade. Without the contribution of the huge amount of export and import, the total amount of GDP wills not that high. - 17 -
b. Thailand The dependency on the international trade also can be seen in Thailand like Malaysia, they also have a higher percentage of international trade than Malaysia. As Table C1.1 shows, in 1970, almost 15 percent of their total GDP was consists of export components. This has been significantly increasing to 54 percent in 2000. For the import side, 19.4 percent of import components was contributed in the total GDP amount on 1970 and has been increasing to 43 percent in 2000. This has been indicated that the international trade gave a very much contributions to the performance of the economic conditions in Thailand year by year. Thus, the dependency of Thailand to the international trade also can be proven through those figures, as what we have done to prove that Malaysia is dependent on the international trade. So that, the economic condition that Malaysian relies on the international trade is not the only one because in the case of the rest of the world, the other countries also have a significantly same conditions. Most of Thailand's major exports which grew considerably in value in 2000 were capital intensive industrial goods such as computers & parts, integrated circuits (IC), vehicles & parts, plastic pellets, radios, TV & parts, iron & steel products, chemical products. Labor intensive industrial goods with strong growth were garments, while agricultural goods which increased substantially in export value were rubber, chilled & frozen shrimps, and so on. c. Korea Korea can also be said that they are dependent on the international trade, but in their case, their level of dependency is not as high as the case of Malaysia and Thailand. In 1971, only 15 percent of the total amount of GDP was consists of export component, and it has been increasing year by year until it reached 45 percent in 2000. Meanwhile, in 1971, the total amount of GDP consists of 26 percent of import components, and in 2000, the percentage increased to 42 percent. This is proved by looking at the Table B17 in the appendix. Exports by products classifications The export earnings in Malaysia are concentrated on manufactured goods and it consists of mainly the electric and electronics components such as semi-conductors, electronic equipment and parts, as well as the electrical machinery and appliances. This condition was mainly due to the structural - 18 -
transformation that has been experienced by Malaysian through these years. The focus of economic activity was not only concentrated to the agricultural products as time passes by, because the Malaysian Economy then put more emphasizes on producing the manufacturing and industrial products. Because manufactured exports have tended to be less volatile than commodity trade, the move towards manufacturing has meant that economic growth in Malaysia has been relatively stable, in spite of a vulnerability to externally induced fluctuations created by the country s openness and trade dependence. Table C 1.3 has proved the statement. As Malaysia focusing on manufactured goods in their exports, Thailand also give the same indicator. The concentration of the manufacturing products in export components also can be seen in Thailand economy. In Table C 1.4, in the early 1950, Thailand s economy was only focusing on the agricultural sector products. As the structural transformation taking place, modern industrialization in Thailand started only in the early 1960s. During the middle of 1970s, the components of manufactured goods ranging from cement to watch parts, and including canned fruit, garments, chemical products, transport equipment and television sets. Meanwhile, in the mid-1980s, textiles, rubber products, processed foods, integrated circuits, metal products, jewelry, footwear, and furniture has been given more emphasizes in the commodities to be exported. As referred to the table, the total export of Thailand consists of 82% of manufactured goods in 1997 and 1998, and 84% in 1999. Two of the main goods that Thailand manufactures for export are Computers Peripherals and Electronic Components. As looked at the exports by product classifications, most of the export was focused on the manufactured goods. As the percentage of manufactured goods was higher for both countries, one can conclude that Malaysia and Thailand, both depends on the international trade. Korea also has the same conditions as what Malaysia and Thailand has been experienced. Most of their export components were consists of the manufacturing goods. Most of those manufactured goods that has been exported exceed the rest which are agriculture, hunting, forestry and fishing, mining and quarrying, electricity, gas and water, construction, wholesale and retail trade, restaurants and hotels, transport, storage and communication, finance, insurance, real estate and business services and community, social and personal services. - 19 -
Imports by economic classification There are certain categories in import components in Malaysia, which are capital goods, intermediate goods, consumption goods and dual use goods. Capital and intermediate good are needed for production activities, so that Malaysia needs to buy those stuffs from other countries to run the production. Thus, the trade with the other countries is very significant to run the production. See Table C1.5. In the case of Thailand, a high degree of diversification has taken place in the industrial sector throughout the past two decades. As a result, industrial activity in Thailand today has become more evenly distributed among many groups of industries and is more complex than in the 1960s. The growth of manufacturing output during the 1960s was characterized by import substitution. The dependency of Thailand to the international trade can be proved by looking to the large number of capital and intermediate goods imported. For each and every year, these kinds of goods have been the highest goods to be imported. The importance of importing those goods indicates that Thailand also was very dependent on the international trade, as the case of Malaysia. See Table C1.6. 2. Dependency by foreign direct investment Foreign Direct Investment has played a leading role in many of the economies of the region, particularly in export sectors, and has been a vital source of foreign capital during the economic crisis. Although only a small share of total investment or employment in the economy, FDI has been a key factor driving export-led growth in Southeast Asia. a. Malaysia Malaysian economy has been diversified away from commodities and into manufacturing, reversing the relative roles of agriculture and manufacturing. This structural transformation is more concentrated in terms of trade, as export have shifted from commodities, primarily rubber and tin, to manufactured goods, mostly electronic goods. As can be seen from the table, Malaysia is too dependent on FDI, especially on the manufacturing sector. In fact, as a Malaysia focusing a very big percentage of the total exports on the manufacturing products, consequently Malaysia is depends on the FDI on the export industry. See Table C 1.7 & Table C 1.8. - 20 -
b. Thailand In the case of Thailand, FDI plays a key role in the process of structural transformation. Electronic products, particularly computer parts and integrated circuits, make up to almost one third of the country s total exports. These sectors are dominated by foreign multinational enterprises, MNEs. Through inward investment, Thailand has become the ninth largest exporter of computers during the 1990s, with computer exports growing fourfold in the past five years. In the early stages of its development, the Thai economy was dominated by local capital. Foreign investors tended to focus on those sectors where the government promoted import substitution. But the situation changed in the second half of 1980 when Thai benefited from a massive relocation of production away from Japan and Newly Industrialization Economy (NIE). FDI inflows took off dramatically after 1987 as compared to the previous year which are in the very modest level. It peaked in 1990. The share of FDI flows in gross fixed capital formation rose from 4% (1970-1985) to 10% from 1985-1990 but dropped again to 3.5% in 1991-1995. Manufacturing represents the largest sector for inward investment. Over one quarter of manufacturing investment is in the electrical equipment sector. The electronic industry has the highest FDI ratio, with foreign investment constituting about 95% of total investment. Automotive and metal-working industries accounted to 80% of total promoted projects. See Table C 1.9. c. Korea For the past three decades, Korea has been one of the fastest growing economies in the world. Even after the foreign currency crisis at the end of 1997. With the implementation of the new administration in February 1998, the nation set as its goal the furtherance of democracy throughout society and of market principles in the economy. Korea has as its target nothing less than being reformed haven for foreign corporations, and is taking every step necessary to induce the inflow of foreign capital. Korea has been experienced an annual economic growth rate of almost 7.47 percent from year 1990 to 1997. On 1997, the total amount of its Gross Domestic Product was about $444.7 billion. From the total amount volume of the trade in Korea which is $280.7 billion, $136.2 billion was consists of the export components, while $144.5 billion of the trade volume was consists of the import part. Basically, the rapid growth was happened in the automotive, machinery, electronics, and information industries. Generally, by industry, as the case of Malaysia and Thailand, the FDI - 21 -
was put much more concentration to the manufacturing and service sectors. It shows the similar increases in FDI. In 1999, 594 cases of FDI were recorded in the manufacturing sector, which resulted in a total investment of $7.1 billion and accounted for 45.9% of total FDI. By business type, the order is as follows: electricity and electronics industry ($3 billion), chemical engineering business ($726 million), transportation instruments ($662 million), machinery ($648 million). The service sector recorded 1,480 cases of FDI this year, which resulted in a total investment of $8.4 billion and accounted for 53.8% of total FDI. By business type, the order is as follows: financial business ($2.3 billion), communications and others ($2.7 billion), hotel ($817 million), and insurance ($ 510 million). Those sectors are the most significant in the performance of the economy. The high rate of investment put in the Korea indicates that Korea is also dependent on the international trade as what Malaysia and has encountered before. (Bank of Korea Annual Report, 2000) PART D: ANALYSIS OF FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT OF MALAYSIA A look at historical data shows that for decades Malaysia s growth has been driven largely by external factors, in particular, FDIs and international trade. The bitter experience of the Asian financial crisis of 1997-1998, demonstrate quite clearly that being too dependent on the external environment will render the economy vulnerable to changes in the external factors, which are very much beyond control. FDI had played a vital role in the development process of Malaysia before and after independence. In the early development phase, majority of the FDIs was concentrated in the agriculture sector. One estimate puts it that about 70% of FDI in Malaysia during the early development was in agriculture (Edward, 1994, page 120). In the Import substitution and Export oriented phase, FDI was targeted mainly to the manufacturing sector. Between 1965 and 1980, total FDI was estimated to have increased by 147% from RM 300 million to 1.4 billion in 1980. Between 1980 and 1995, Malaysia received FDI by TNCs totaling RM 120 billion. 7 The importance of FDI in the total investment of the 7 The Changing Phases of Malaysian Economy, 1999, p:121-22 -
country increased. In 1981 the share of FDI to total investment was 29%, 33% in 1986 and 54% in 1988. And by 1995, Malaysia was one of the largest recipients of in ASEAN. (Table D 1.0) It can observed that from early 1980, that mot of the FDI I in the manufacturing sector especially the Electrical& Electronic (E& E) products and food proceeding industries. (Table D1.1 and 1.2). From bank Negara statistics, the main sources of FDI inflows into Malaysia were United Kingdom, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, Taiwan and United States of America. US was the main source of FDI n the oil sector and in manufacturing sector Japan was the leading in the early 1980, but Taiwan and US overtook in 1990s.( Table D1.3,1.4) Implications of the pattern of FDI received This show that, in the development process of Malaysia, foreign investments has played major role and this suggest that Malaysia is over dependence on the flow of FDI for growth. The major engine of growth was the manufacturing sector, and in this sector the dominance of foreign companies can be seen from the Table D1.5 and D1.6.The MIDA data show that foreign direct investment in the manufacturing sector has increased in absolute value, 34% in 1990 and was 44.5% in 1994. This increase in investment was highest in the E&E sector and it share rose from 40% in 1985 to 73% in 1989. And E&E has been the most important manufactured export commodity playing the major role in the export led growth. In "Foreign Direct Investment: A study of Malaysia's Balance of Payments position", Phang Hooi Eng, a Senior Manager in the Economics Department at Bank Negara Malaysia (the Malaysian central bank) she explained that, in the manufacturing sector, regardless of whether firm were foreign or local, less than 20% concentrated on the domestic market. 8 But the foreign firms play vital role in the export market of Malaysia than the local firms. She find that comparing local and foreign firm, the latter were more export orientated 37% of foreign and 20% of local export more than 70% of their total output. (Table D1.7).Thus, this also reveals that the performance of manufacturing sector is highly dependent on the international trade since most of the manufacturing firms exports most of their production. 8 "Foreign Direct Investment, 1998,p,16-23 -
In her book Phang Hooi Eng has also done an extensive study on the impact of FDI on Malaysian economy. The study, "Foreign Direct Investment: A study of Malaysia's Balance of Payments position", uses a variety of data sources to look at the direct effects of FDI on the BOP. But given the difficulties of finding appropriate shadow prices for evaluating various inputs and outputs, and the need to break down foreign contribution into its financial and technological components, the study has not attempted to measure the "total" effects on the economy, but only discusses the indirect effects. And while FDI brings both benefits and ill-effects, the study advocates measures that the government could take to encourage domestic investment and, at the least will not favor foreign investment at the expense of local. The country, she adds, has to adopt a more selective approach to promoting and encouraging FDI, since FDI "also has an important negative effect on the country's balance of payments." On this, and some other matters, Phang's study, based on data, contradicts the bald dismissal of these negative effects by a WTO Senior Advisor, Zdenek Drabek. In a paper published in the FONDAD publications to promote the MAI, Drabek says the arguments of critics about FDI's adverse effects on BOP, savings and, through decapitalization effect, on domestic growth, "are not viable" and receive "declining support from academics, policy-makers, journalists and other experts as "there is no theoretical reason" to provide support for these ideas. Drabek paper, presented in November 1997 (four months after the meltdown of Asian markets began), says the empirical evidence also contradicts these fears "as illustrated by the economic successes of Southeast Asian countries." Phang finds that foreign firms in Malaysia are more export-oriented, but they also have higher import content. While for local firms, import content decreased from 0.22 in 1981 to 0.18 in 1985, and increased again to 0.22 in 1988, for foreign firms the import ratio in the manufacturing sector rose from 0.41 in 1981 to 0.45 in 1985, dipping slightly to 0.43 in 1988. 9 This can explained part of the story why Malaysia has high import content in their export. It is because of the production pattern of the Multinational operating in the region. She added that since the electronics industry is the most important in the manufacturing sector in terms of output, exports and imports, the significant difference between local and foreign firms will have a significant impact on the BOP. 9 DOS Annual Financial Survey of Limited Companies - 24 -