GTAP Resources: Resource Display
| GTAP Resource #7699 |
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"Paving the Way to Efficiency: Evaluating Transport Projects in Argentina Using Web-Scraped Data" Authors: Mercatante, Juan Ignacio, Maria Laura Ojeda, Maria Priscila Ramos and Carlos Adrián Romero Abstract Transport infrastructure plays a central role in shaping production costs, market integration, and economic performance, particularly in countries where freight relies predominantly on road networks. In Argentina, the deterioration of key highways used intensively for goods transportation constitutes a major source of logistical inefficiency, increasing travel times and operating costs for firms across multiple provinces. These constraints are especially severe in the Norte Grande region, an area characterized by high poverty rates, low economic density, and limited connectivity, where logistics costs are estimated to be up to 50 percent higher than in central regions. This paper evaluates the economy-wide impacts of selected road infrastructure projects in five provinces of Argentina's Norte Grande (Catamarca, Chaco, Corrientes, Jujuy, and Salta) using province-level Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) models. We integrate Python-based web scraping techniques with CGE modeling to construct realistic, route-specific transport cost shocks grounded in the actual structure of the national road network. Using automated web scraping applied to Google Maps, we identify the most time-efficient routes between 123 urban centers and map more than 46,000 origin-destination flows to specific road segments. Engineering-based estimates of road improvements are translated into percentage reductions in transport costs at the route level. The CGE simulations indicate that the evaluated road projects generate positive economic impacts across all five provinces, with average gains exceeding one percent of provincial GDP and particularly strong effects in Jujuy. Real household income increases by more than two percent on average. At the national level, the combined interventions are associated with an increase of approximately 0.68 percent in GDP, reflecting significant interprovincial spillovers. |
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- Other data bases and data issues - Infrastructure - Transportation - Model extension/development - South America |
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Public Access  GTAP Resource 7699 (500.9 KB) Replicated: 0 time(s)Restricted Access No documents have been attached. Special Instructions No instructions have been specified. |
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Last Modified: 4/15/2026 11:27:11 AM
