中国加入世界贸易组织对农业和非农业收入间的不平等与农村贫困的长期影响.pdf

Long-Run Impacts of China’s WTO Accession on Farm- Nonfarm Income Inequality and Rural Poverty* † ‡ § Kym Anderson, Jikun Huang, and Elena Ianchovichina Abstract Many fear China’s accession to WTO will impoverish its rural people, via greater import competition in its agricultural markets. We explore that possibility bearing in mind that, even if producer prices of some (land-intensive) farm products fall, prices of other (labor-intensive) farm products could rise. Also, the removal of restrictions on exports of textiles and clothing could boost town and village enterprises, so demand for unskilled labor for non-farm work in rural areas may grow even if demand for farm labor in aggregate falls. New estimates, from the global, economy-wide numerical simulation model known as GTAP, of the likely changes in agricultural and other product prices as a result of WTO accession are drawn on to examine empirically the factor reward implications of China’s WTO accession. The results suggest farm-nonfarm and Western-Eastern income inequality may well rise within China but rural-urban income inequality need not. The paper concludes with some policy suggestions for alleviating any pockets of farm household poverty that may emerge as a result of WTO accession. Key words: WTO accession, China’s economic reform, rural-urban income inequality JEL codes: F14, O19, O53 World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3052, May 2003 The Policy Research Working Paper Series disseminates the findings of work in progress to encourage the exchange of ideas about development issues. An objective of the series