Seaborne shipping is the dominant mode of transport in international trade in agricultural products, and an increasing part of seaborne agricultural trade is carried in containers. Furthermore, the majority of world containers are moved through liner shipping services, that is, regular transport services provided by global shipping companies which comprise a dense network connecting ports and countries around the world. Using a theoretically consistent gravity equation and a novel identification strategy based on the use of intra-national trade flows, this paper investigates the effect of liner shipping connectivity on international trade in agricultural products. The results show that liner shipping connectivity has a positive and statistically significative effect on agricultural trade. Moreover, this positive effect can be observed for the majority of the agricultural products analysed and is also identified for countries at different stages of development. These findings appear especially relevant in terms of the objective of increasing less developed countries' participation in global agricultural trade.

中文翻译：

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海上互联互通和农产品贸易

海运是农产品国际贸易的主要运输方式，越来越多的农产品海运贸易采用集装箱运输。此外，世界上大多数集装箱都是通过班轮运输服务运输的，即由全球航运公司提供的定期运输服务，该服务包括连接世界各地港口和国家的密集网络。本文利用理论上一致的引力方程和基于国内贸易流的新颖识别策略，研究了班轮运输连通性对农产品国际贸易的影响。结果表明，班轮运输互联互通对农产品贸易具有积极且具有统计显着性的影响。此外，在所分析的大多数农产品中都可以观察到这种积极影响，并且对于处于不同发展阶段的国家也可以发现这种积极影响。这些发现对于增加欠发达国家参与全球农产品贸易的目标尤其相关。