Research Seminar "The Role of Robot Adoption in Shaping Export and Import Activities: the case of Sweden " (Chiara Franco)

RESEARCH SEMINAR

Wednesday, 25th March 2026 at14.00-15.00

Zoom

CHIARA FRANCO (University of Pisa)

The Role of Robot Adoption in Shaping Export and Import Activities: the case of Sweden

This paper investigates the impact of industrial robot investments on international trade flows, focusing on Sweden, a leading European country in robot adoption that has been largely overlooked in the automation literature. While previous studies have primarily addressed the employment effects of automation, this research shifts the attention to trade, examining whether increased exposure to robots stimulates export and import activities at the municipality-sector level over the period 2000–2019. A novel measure of robot exposure is introduced, combining sectoral data from the International Federation of Robotics with localized investment in machinery to produce a granular indicator of automation intensity. Using a rich dataset that integrates firm-level and worker-level administrative records, we estimate a first difference model that controls for workforce composition and local economic conditions. Our results show that robot adoption significantly boosts exports and imports. When disaggregated by trading partner, we find that robot exposure increases the exports fraction to EU countries but has a negative effect on trade with non-EU Europe and North America. These findings suggest that automation reshapes the geography of trade by enhancing competitiveness in specific markets.

Co-author: Francesco Suppressa (Unioversity of Pisa)