Pakistan’s Agricultural Exports to SCO Member States: Pre and Post Integration Assessment

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17572353

Abstract

This study explores the impact of regional integration on Pakistan’s agricultural export performance within the framework of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). Using annual panel data from 2010 to 2023, the study employs an advance technique Difference-in-Differences (DID) to estimate how Pakistan’s agricultural exports progressed after obtaining full SCO membership in 2017. The empirical model integrates key determinants of trade, including GDP, population, distance, and shared borders, along with country and time fixed effects to control for unobserved heterogeneity and multilateral resistance factors. The findings of the study indicate statistically significant and positive post-integration effect on Pakistan’s agricultural exports to SCO countries. The event study confirmed the parallel trends assumption, validating the DID approach, while the robustness tests through alternative estimation Poisson Pseudo-Maximum Likelihood (PPML) verified that the observed trade gains were not driven by random fluctuations.  The comparative pre-post overview of agriculture exports analysis highlights that Pakistan’s agricultural exports performed better after SCO integration, with both export values and growth rates showing a marked improvement. This suggests that regional integration under the SCO framework has played a supportive role in enhancing Pakistan’s agricultural trade performance, potentially due to improved market access, reduced trade barriers, and greater regional cooperation. However, the results also highlight the need for policy focus on diversification, value addition, and institutional reforms to sustain agricultural export growth within the SCO framework.

Keywords: Agricultural Export, Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Trade Integration, Pakistan Economy, Pre and Post Assessment