ROMANIA’S TRADE IN SERVICES: REAPING THE BENEFITS OF GLOBALIZATION

Ample anecdotal evidence over the last couple of years points to Romania’s growing attractiveness as location for offshoring decisions by Western companies, and the subsequent rise in offshoring-related services activities. This paper aims to explore if and to what extent these relatively new developments are backed up by official trade and FDI statistics. Drawing on recent literature on the topic of services offshoring, it analyzes Romania’s trade and FDI flows in services over the 1995-2008 period in terms of dynamics, composition and performance. The findings of the empirical investigation suggest that the remarkable export growth in some individual services categories in the last years, as well as the positive changes under way in the patterns of services trade are largely driven by globalization, i.e. by enhanced offshoring activities hosted by the Romanian economy