RDP 9212: Changes in the Characteristics of the Australian Business Cycle: Some Lessons for Monetary Policy from the 1980s and Early 1990s Appendix
December 1992
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(a) Volatility of the terms of trade
The volatility of the terms of trade of a number of industrial countries is calculated over the period 1949 to 1991 (except where noted by an *). The data are annual and obtained from the International Financial Statistics. The terms of trade is defined as the ratio of export unit values to import unit values. The volatility is measured as the average annual absolute percentage change in the terms of trade; that is the average size of the annual percentage change without regard to sign. These statistics are reported in column 2 below. The table also reports the average annual percentage change and the standard deviation of these changes.
| Absolute Mean | Mean | Standard Deviation | |
|---|---|---|---|
| New Zealand | 8.1 | 0.4 | 11.2 |
| Australia | 7.7 | −1.3 | 10.8 |
| Japan* | 6.3 | 0.1 | 10.1 |
| Turkey* | 6.0 | −3.0 | 8.3 |
| Iceland* | 5.7 | 1.9 | 7.6 |
| Spain* | 5.4 | −0.04 | 7.5 |
| Finland | 4.6 | 0.4 | 7.3 |
| Greece* | 4.3 | −0.2 | 5.5 |
| Norway | 4.2 | 0.6 | 6.3 |
| Germany* | 3.9 | 1.5 | 4.9 |
| Switzerland* | 3.8 | 0.9 | 4.8 |
| Denmark | 3.6 | −0.04 | 5.0 |
| Italy | 3.5 | −0.1 | 5.1 |
| Ireland* | 3.5 | −0.05 | 5.3 |
| France | 3.3 | 0.1 | 4.8 |
| Sweden | 3.2 | −0.04 | 5.4 |
| United Kingdom* | 3.1 | 0.3 | 4.5 |
| United States | 3.0 | −0.6 | 4.2 |
| Austria | 2.9 | −0.1 | 4.2 |
| Canada | 2.7 | −0.1 | 3.6 |
| Belgium/Luxembourg | 2.4 | −0.3 | 3.7 |
| Netherlands | 2.1 | −0.4 | 2.8 |
* Germany 1953–1991, Greece 1952–1991, Iceland 1957–1990, Ireland 1954–1991, Japan 1952–1991, Spain 1957–1991, Switzerland 1949–1987, United Kingdom 1950–1991. |
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(b) Growth in manufactured exports
Table A2 ranks manufactured exports by their contribution to growth over the period 1986/87 to 1991/92. Shaded rows indicate Standard Industrial Trade Classification (SITC) divisions which consist predominantly of products receiving some form of direct export assistance as identified by the Industry Commission (1992).
| EXPORT VOLUMES 1984/85 Prices 1991/92 | EXPORT VOLUMES ANNUAL CHANGE 86/87–91/92 |
EXPORT VOLUMES CONTR. 86/87–91/92 |
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SITC DIVISION | CATEGORY | $M | % | %.pts. |
| 75 | Office machines and automatic data processing machines | 1,762 | 29.1 | 28.1 |
| 66 | Non-metallic mineral manufactures, nes | 441 | 23.3 | 6.3 |
| 89 | Miscellaneous manufactured articles, nes | 458 | 15.9 | 5.3 |
| 79 | Transport equipment (excl road vechicles) | 767 | 7.0 | 4.9 |
| 78 | Road Vechicles (incl air cushion vechicles) | 689 | 8.7 | 4.5 |
| 54 | Medicinal and pharmaceutlat products | 319 | 19.7 | 4.2 |
| 71 | Power generating machinery and equipment | 410 | 12.0 | 3.9 |
| 87 | Professional, scientific and controlling Instruments and apparatus, nes | 324 | 15.0 | 3.6 |
| 69 | Manufactures of metals, nes | 377 | 11.9 | 3.6 |
| 57 | Plastics in primary forms | 161 | 109.4 | 3.5 |
| 53 | Dyeing, tanning and colouring materials | 170 | 47.9 | 3.2 |
| 52 | Inorganic chemicals | 198 | 27.0 | 3.1 |
| 72 | Machinery specialised tor particular Industries | 396 | 8.9 | 3.1 |
| 11 | Beverages | 250 | 16.2 | 2.9 |
| 74 | General industrial machinery and equipment, nes and machine parts, nes | 338 | 10.3 | 2.9 |
| 77 | Electrical machinery, apparatus, appliances, parts (Incl. non-elec, counterparts of electrical domestic equipment) | 322 | 8.8 | 2.5 |
| 61 | Leather, leather manufactures, and dressed furskins, nes | 202 | 13.3 | 2.1 |
| 84 | Articles of apparel and clothing accessories | 122 | 32.4 | 2.0 |
| 75 | Telecommunications and sound recording and reproducing apparatus and equipment | 151 | 16.3 | 1.8 |
| 64 | Paper, paperboard, and articles of paper pulp, of paper or of paperboard | 153 | 12.2 | 1 .5 |
| 55 | Essential oils and resinoids and perfume materials; toilet, polishing and cleansing preparations | 101 | 15.6 | 1.2 |
| 88 | Photographic apparatus equipment and supplles and optical goods next watches and clocks | 282 | 3.8 | 1.1 |
| 81 | Prefabricated buildings; sanitary, plumbing, heating and lighting fixtures and fittings, nes | 55 | 35.6 | 1.0 |
| 63 | Cork and wood manufactures (excl. furniture) | 41 | 38.7 | 0.7 |
| 62 | Rubber manufactures, nes | 64 | 12.2 | 0.6 |
| 65 | Textile yarn, fabrics, made-up articles, nes, and related products | 128 | 4.6 | 0.6 |
| 73 | Metal working machinery | 47 | 16.4 | 0.6 |
| 85 | Footwear , | 27 | 24.6 | 0.4 |
| 59 | Chemical materials and products, nes | 127 | 3.1 | 0.4 |
| 82 | Furniture, parts thereof; bedding, mattresses, mattress supports, cushions and similar stuffed furnishings | 37 | 6.5 | 0.2 |
| 56 | Fertilisers (excl. crude) | 10 | 14.9 | 0.1 |
| 51 | Organic chemicals | 55 | 0.7 | 0.0 |
| 83 | Travel goods, handbags and similar containers | 4 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| 58 | Plastics in non-primary forms | 70 | −10.8 | −1.2 |
| ASSISTED CATEGORIES | 4,466 | 15.7 | 51.4 | |
| UNASSISTED CATEGORIES | 4,482 | 13.7 | 47.2 | |
| TOTAL | 8,948 | 14.7 | 98.6 | |
| Shaded rows Indicate assisted industry. | ||||
(c) Commodity classification of exports and imports
Exports and imports are broadly classified into three categories: rural; resource based and manufactures, using data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. Table A3 shows the corresponding SITC sections or divisions which make up the categories reported in Table 3.1:
| Commodity based | SITC rev. 3 section or division |
|---|---|
| Rural | 0, 1, 4, 21–26, 29 |
| Resource based | 27, 28, 3, 67, 68 |
| Manufactures | 5, 61–66, 69, 7, 8 |
Figure 3.4 differs very slightly from this classification in that beverages (SITC division 11) is included in manufactured exports rather than rural.