Estimating the effect of COVID-19 epidemic on shipping trade: An empirical analysis using panel data.

ABSTRACT

The unexpected outbreak of COVID-19 epidemic is an unpredictable event in shipping trade. In this paper, we mainly investigate the gaps that occur in the shipping trade between China and different regions during the period February-October 2020 and to provide useful information for operation management of shipping industry. The data include a panel obtained from the National Statistics Institute to analyze the gap where a selected group of shipping trade in three regions are considered European Union, North America, and Southeast Asia. On this basis, a dynamic panel data model is proposed to estimate the trend. We observe that government prevention and control measures have a negative impact on export trade, while import trade increases accordingly.