The Investigation of the Comparative Advantage of Exportable Commodities in Iranian Petrochemical Industry

Abstract

To measure the comparative advantage, different indexes have been suggested by economists. In this paper we investigate the “revealed comparative advantage” for the products of the Iranian Petrochemical Industry using the Ballasa and Vollrath index. The results show that Iran gains comparative advantage in exporting the products of petrochemical industry. The share of these exports from the whole manufacturing exports of the country, based on the paper’s calculation results, is shown to be increasing.

Keywords

• international trade
• comparative advantage
• petrochemical industry
• revealed comparative advantage
• iran