TREND, DIRECTION AND PERFORMANCE OF AFGHANISTAN’S INTERNATIONAL TRADE

Abstract

Afghanistan is at a strategic location which acts as an important corridor in Asia and connects powerful industrial economies such as India and China to Northern Asia and to Europe via dry and seaways and vice versa through the Lapis Lazuli Corridor, Chabahar port and other corridors. The study asses to perceive the performance and trend of Afghanistan’s export and import. Moreover, the study points out to the destinations of Afghanistan's exports by regions and origin of Afghanistan’s imports by regions. The paper descriptively concentrates on direction, trend, and performance of the Afghanistan trade. The data is retrieved from numerous secondary sources encompass National Statistic and Information Authority and Ministry of Trade and Industry of Afghanistan. The period selected is from 2002 to 2018. Moreover, the research is based on quantitative data and descriptive statistics have been used to analyze the trend and direction of the Afghanistan trade. The study shows that there is an ascending direction of Afghanistan's export to Emerging and Developing Asian Economies majorly includes Pakistan, India and Bangladesh, while it indicates a descending export direction to Advanced Economies, Commonwealth Independent States, Middle East, and European Nations. Furthermore, Afghanistan's import shared with the regions is in an unstable form. JEL Classification Codes: F1, F10, F19.