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Chinese Journal of Management Science ›› 2026, Vol. 34 ›› Issue (8): 139-149.doi: 10.16381/j.cnki.issn1003-207x.2023.0764

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Re-export Trade, Setting up Factories Overseas or Bearing High Tariffs: Reconstruction Strategy for International Supply Chain under Tariff Increases

Nengmin Zeng1,2, Lean Yu1,2,3()   

  1. 1.School of Economics and Management,Harbin Engineering University,Harbin 150001,China
    2.Key Laboratory of Big Data and Business Intelligence Technology (Harbin Engineering University),Ministry of Industry and Information Technology,Harbin 150001,China
    3.Business School,Sichuan University,Chengdu 610065,China
  • Received:2023-05-08 Revised:2024-01-20 Online:2026-08-25 Published:2026-07-14
  • Contact: Lean Yu E-mail:yulean@amss.ac.cn

Abstract:

With the downturn of world economy and the rise of anti-globalization, increasing number of countries begin to take the way of tariff intervention to build trade barriers. The supply chain decision-making models are constructed based on re-export trade, setting up factories overseas and bearing high tariffs under tariff intervention. Under the re-export strategy, the manufacturer of the country of origin exports products to a third country, and the middleman of the third country labels the products and exports them to the intervention country to avoid the additional tariffs; under the strategy of setting up factories overseas, the manufacturer move their factories to the intervention country or a third country to avoid tariff intervention; under the strategy of bearing high tariff, the manufacturer maintains the production in the country of origin and bears the high tariff imposed. It is found that if the manufacturer adopts the strategy of bearing high tariffs, it will bear most of the losses caused by the imposition of tariffs, and only a small amount of losses can be passed on to the retailer and consumers in the tariff intervention country. Under the strategy of bearing high tariffs, when the market size of products is small, the tariff revenue of the intervention country is lower than the sum of the utility losses of the retailer and consumers; that is, tariff intervention makes the intervention country suffer losses. When the market size of products is large, tariff intervention will benefit the intervening country. Whether the manufacturer chooses the strategy of re-export trade, setting up factories overseas or bearing high tariffs, compared with the benchmark model, tariff intervention always leads to a net loss of social welfare. In addition, if the fixed cost of setting up factory overseas is high and the additional tax rate is not too high, the manufacturer does not need to reconstruct its own supply chain; that is, the manufacturer chooses to bear the high tariff; Otherwise, the manufacturer should restructure its supply chain: when the fixed cost is low, it should adopt the strategy of setting up factories overseas; when the fixed cost is high and the tax rate is too high, it should select the strategy of re-export trade. However, for the downstream retailer, the strategy of setting up factories overseas is most beneficial.

Key words: supply chain management, tariff, reconstruction strategy

CLC Number: