AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS OF INTERINDUSTRY AND INTRA-INDUSTRY TRADE BETWEEN INDIA AND ASEAN – THE IMPACT OF REVEALED COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGE (RCA) IN COMMODITIES

International co-operation or integration among countries is quite common in today's world. India and the ASEAN (Association of South-East Asian Nations) countries have an illustrious history of mutual cooperation for more than 25 years with a shared goal of economic prosperity through strategic convergence. The deepening of ties in mutually beneficial trade between India and ASEAN nations is reflected in the continued buoyancy in trade figures recently ($ 142 billion in 2018- 19). This paper tries to shed some light on the most recent trends and patterns in the trade scenario between India and ASEAN-5 nations (inter-industry as well as intraindustry). Here, the five original members of ASEAN are considered (i.e. Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand which also are the largest economies among ASEAN members. The status of trade among these countries is important because there has been increase in total trade among these countries recently. Many reports and surveys have confirmed a potential increase in economic integration in future which will contribute to economic growth in these regions. Furthermore, the Revealed Comparative advantage (RCA) index is constructed for the commodities in which simultaneous imports and exports has been taking place during the study period that is 2000-2017. The RCA index gives the result whether a country has a comparative advantage in the production of a certain commodity or not. The study seeks to answer the research question whether the level of intra-industry trade increase when a country has revealed comparative advantage in case of the production of certain commodities?