April 27, 2021: Former Executive Director of the IBA Karachi and Chairperson of the National Business Education Accreditation Council, Dr. Farrukh Iqbal, gave an online guest lecture to the students. In his discussion, he primarily focused on analyzing the linkages between international trade and economic development in the world.
Appreciating the gains from free trade, Dr. Iqbal identified how empirical data showcased a direct cause-and-effect relationship between trade liberalization and economic prosperity. Nevertheless, he recognized that empirical analyses have not been able to quantify the absolute contribution of trade to growth in world output.
Dr. Iqbal highlighted that the consensus among economists regarding economic development resulting from the expansion of markets via free trade may be traced back to as far as Alfred Marshall. In large continental countries, such expansion has occurred via domestic trade. For smaller units, on the other hand, such expansion was a result of international trade.
He also spoke about the expansion of the US as well as the European economies in the 1850-1915 period and asserted that the resultant growth among these economies may be partially attributed to the expansion of trade among them. Dr. Iqbal, however, added that this is not a view of consensus in economic debates. Some economists view nontrade factors – education, technological advancements, or change in governance – are more significant determinants of development than trade.
Furthermore, Dr. Iqbal's discussion focused on elaborating the misjudgments among economic scholars. Although economic viewpoint in the mid-twentieth century associated trade in primary products as a typical indicator of less developed economies, Dr. Iqbal argued that the concept of immiserizing growth is rather theoretical.
