There is not a consensus about a complete set of explanatory variables that could
ultimately explain the linkages behind achieving economic development. In spite of
this, determinants of economic development and especially the linkages between
economic development and logistics performance are topics of growing interest within
the recent literature, both in economic growth theory and maritime studies.
In this paper our attention is focused on the importance of logistics performance
as one of the explanatory variables for economic development. To this end, we have
estimated different econometric models in an attempt to explain the probability of a
country being economically developed, based on a number of traditional explanatory
variables (including natural endowments, economic openness, and institutional
framework, among others) along with logistics performance as the major theoretical
innovation. The applied methodology follows the binary choice framework described
in probit models.
In the next step the research is concentrated on the determination of possible
endogenous causalities of the economic development. In the last section we estimate
the logistics gap, measured as a probability of reaching economic development that
varies due to differences in the levels of logistics performance.
Our main finding shows that logistics performance is closely related to the probability
of a country being developed. Specifically, the probability of being a developed
country increases when logistics performance is improved.En la literatura económica, no existe un pleno consenso acerca del conjunto
de variables explicativas que inciden sobre el desarrollo económico. Por otra
parte, la vinculación entre el crecimiento y desarrollo económico y el desempeño
logístico son tópicos de creciente interés en la literatura especializada.
En este documento prestamos especial atención al papel del desempeño
logístico como una de las variables explicativas del desarrollo económico. Para
este fin, hemos estimado diferentes modelos econométricos que buscan explicar
cómo se afecta la probabilidad de un país de ser desarrollado al considerar
algunas variables explicativas tradicionales (la dotación de recursos naturales,
la apertura económica, y variables institucionales, entre otras), junto con el
desempeño logístico. La metodología aplicada se basó en la utilización de modelos
probit.
El principal hallazgo del trabajo ha sido el de encontrar una incidencia positiva
entre el desempeño logístico y la probabilidad de un país de ser desarrollado.
Particularmente, la probabilidad de un país de ser desarrollado se
incrementa cuando mejora el desempeño logístico