The effect of change in exchange rates on an economy is very important, especially, to a small open economy like South Korea. I explore whether Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) have positive influences on exchange rate-pass through import price of import market for fishery products in South Korea. Competition among FTA partners is enhanced after FTAs are effective. I expect that the extent to which are exchange rate pass-through (hereafter, ERPT) into import price of fishery products (in terms of Korea currency) would be reduced since the import market for fishery products in South Korea is an oligopolistic market. Specifically, I　investigate two research questions with six South Korea’s FTA partners─Norway, Thailand, Peru, U.S., China and Vietnam. First, whether the extent to which are exchange rate pass-through into import price of fishery products from six FTA partners would decrase in the post-FTA era; seconds, the size of reduction has a negative relation with the size of their market share in the import market for fishery products in South Korea if it decreases. The empirical results indicate that the degree of ERPT into import price from other FTA partners than Norway has been reduced after FTA, statistically and significantly; however, I do not find the evidence that the size of reduction is related to their market share. The findings in this study imply that FTAs have negative effects on producers’ economic welfare in South Korea’s fishery industry by reducing the extent to which are exchange rate pass-through as well as reducing tariff barriers.

I explore that South Korea’s major import fishery product markets-frozen hairtail, frozen mackerel, frozen pollock and frozen squid-are integrated by testing whether there is favorable evidence of the law of one price (LOP). Unlike previous studies on the LOP for fishery product markets, I assume non-zero import costs and include them in a trade model. To explore whether LOP holds for major import fishery product markets in South Korea with non-zero import costs, I utilize a non-linear time-series model, Smooth Transition Autoregressive (STAR) model with the sample periods from January in 2002 to December in 2019. I find that the behaviors of home-foreign price (i.e., import price) differentials of all four major import fishery products are non-linear depending on whether trade occurs and favorable evidence of LOP for each import market in South Korea. These findings indicate that each of South Korea’s major import fishery product markets is integrated. They imply that the supply of each major import fishery product-frozen hairtail, frozen pollock, frozen mackerel and frozen squid, and their prices are stable even if there is an economic shock on each market. When it comes to trade policy implications, the Korean trade policy including tariffs or quotas against their import countries for the four major import fishery products may not have influences on their price in the markets.

Although the main objective of Free Trade Agreements (FTA) is market integration among member countries, there are limited studies supporting this impact. Our study explores whether FTA has enhanced market integration between South Korea and its FTA partners, focusing on South Korea’s fishery product import market. We investigate two research questions concerning FTA impacts: first, whether trade costs declined when South Korea imported fishery products from its FTA partners after the FTA; second, if the speed of the convergence of South Korea-its FTA partners’price differential of imported fishery products on trade costs result to occur more quickly after the FTA. To determine these outcomes, we utilize a Threshold Autoregressive Model covering the sample periods from January 2002 to April 2017. Our findings demonstrate the effects of FTA on market integration are different among FTA partners. FTA has enhanced the market integration between South Korea and Norway, Vietnam, and Spain, respectively, but not for others. Therefore, we find positive evidence of FTA on fishery import market integration between South Korea and Norway, Vietnam and Spain, respectively.

Korea-US FTA amendment became effective January 1, 2019 through several trade negotiations between the two countries. These amendments did not include changes in the agricultural sector. However, given the policy direction of the Trump administration, it is difficult to be certain that the existing Korea-US FTA on the agricultural sector will remain unchanged. This study examines the potential impact of changes in the US beef import tariff rates under the Korea-US FTA, which is progressively eliminated until 2026 using a dynamic partial equilibrium model. The modelling system is simulated with 100% decreases of tariff rates over 2020~2026 period and then compared to the baseline which is developed based on the current Korea–US FTA tariff rates. According to the scenario analyses results, 100% decreases of US beef tariff rate lowered Korean beef cattle production value up to 4.23%. Looking at this change in terms of absolute value rather than percentage, the total production value over 2020~2026 is expected to decrease by 815 billion won compared to Baseline. This reduction in production value in dynamic analysis is 67 billion won higher than the comparative static analysis.