Macroeconomic Determinants of India’s Participation in Global Value Chains: An Empirical Evidence

Abstract

Global value chains (GVCs) have significantly changed the world trade scenario. Many developed countries gained benefits through production fragmentation, and it has worked as hope for the developing world. India is also one of the participants but its share in global GVC space is very limited. The recent pandemic comes with a lot of opportunities for India to emerge as a new GVC hub in the Asia-Pacific region. This requires the study of factors determining the extent of India’s participation in GVCs. The present article is an attempt in this direction wherein various factors determining the forward and backward participation levels are identified. At a macro level, the study found the positive role of technology advancement, domestic capital and industrial capacity in promoting the level of participation in GVCs, while the role of net FDI inflows is found to be negative. This highlights the requirement for conducive policies to reap the maximum benefits associated with foreign capital. India is already observing the benefits and growing, but still, it has to cover a long path. The time has come to make an image of the brand India in the world and reap maximum benefits from the GVC participation.