The Quality of Imported Fruits in China

Fruits are an important part of a healthy diet. This article proposes a simple derivation from the gravity models to analyze the determinants of the quality of imported fruits in China between 1987 and 2012. The results indicate that there is a trade-off between quality and quantity. Price has a significant substitution effect on quality. The quality elasticity with respect to China\’s per capita GDP is around 1.96. Rich countries tend to export high-quality fruits to China. Other characteristics of exporting countries such as population size, geographic factors, relative endowment of land, as well as regional trading arrangement also have some impact on the quality of imported fruits in China.