Determinantes de las importaciones del Ecuador, estructuradas por uso o destino económico, periodo 2008 - 2017

Abstract

This paper estimates the impact of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and the Real Exchange Rate (TCR) on Ecuador's Total Imports and its fractions classified by their destination or economic use, in the period 2008 - 2017. For this purpose, based on the Model of Demands of Imports for Imperfect Substitution and following the Error Correction Mechanism methodology, impulse - response functions of the Vector Autoregression (VAR) models were used. The results obtained indicate that GDP is the main determinant in Total Imports, while the TCR exerts a greater influence on imports of consumption, raw materials and investments. In the short term, the TCR is the one determinant that mostly explains imports change rates, while GDP influences the imports in the long term. These results are consistent with the data published by the Central Bank of Ecuador (BCE), which indicate that during the oil boom, that generated significant GDP growth, total imports doubled, although their structure was not modified.