Kumuthini Sivathas

Kumuthini Sivathas

School of Economics and Public Policy

Faculty of Arts, Business, Law and Economics

Kumuthini Sivathas is a Research Fellow at the Institute for International Trade. She is an applied economist interested in answering policy relevant questions at the intersection of trade, development, environment, and resource economics. She is a joint Recipient of the Award of Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence in Trade & Environment for the project titled "The Impact of Export Restrictions on Trade in Critical Minerals for Green Products". Kumuthini has worked on multiple assignments for the Institute for International Trade at the University of Adelaide, including trade-related technical assistance and capacity building by Australia to its developing country free trade agreement partners.
Kumuthini previously held a position as a Research Fellow at the World Trade Organization in Geneva, within the Trade Policy Review Division, where she worked on welfare evaluations of regional trade agreements such as RCEP and CPTPP, using general equilibrium models, grounded in the structural gravity framework. Earlier, she worked at Verité Research, an independent think tank in Colombo, where she contributed to Sri Lanka's extended trade adjustment program, national budget monitoring, and political economy analyses of the agricultural sector.

My doctoral research evaluated the welfare consequences of trade liberalization amidst demographic changes. The first chapter offers key facts about trading blocs by looking at them through the lens of population changes. It also reviews existing research and points out where including demographic factors could change the analysis of trade patterns. The second chapter shows how incorporating projected market sizes, that are determined by future changes in population and productivity, is important when evaluating future free trade agreements. The final chapter assesses the welfare impacts of two trading blocs namely CPTPP and RCEP using a standard quantitative trade model, after accounting for their deepness.

I'm currently working on projects that examine the effects of export controls on critical minerals trade, as well as the assessment of free trade agreements from the Asia – Pacific region such as RCEP, CEPA between India and Japan, AANZFTA and MAFTA. I’m interested in answering policy-relevant questions at the intersection of trade, development, environment, and resource economics such as: What are the effects of export controls on selected industries (e.g. critical minerals)? what are the effects of preferential trade agreements and deep trade agreements? What are the effects of trade facilitation agreements? And what are the effects of trade-related technical assistance and capacity building on developing countries?

I’m using both econometric methods and quantitative trade models to analyze the effect of trade policies on trade and welfare in developed and developing countries.

  • Journals
    Year Citation
    2024 Sivathas, K. (2024). International Trade Amid Demographic Changes: A Review. under revision and resubmission.

  • Working Paper
    Year Citation
    2024 Heid, B., & Sivathas, K. (2024). Market size and the evaluation of future trade agreements: The role of population and TFP growth.
    2024 Heid, B., & Sivathas, K. (2024). Market size and the evaluation of future trade agreements: The role of population and TFP growth.

2025 : Award of Jean Monnet Centre of Excellence in Trade & Environment with Meng Yu Ngov and Shraddha Gautam (3,500 Euros)                                                        

2024: Research Fellowship Grant by World Trade Organization (10,000 Swiss Francs)                           

2024: Research Internship Grant by University of Adelaide (9,000 AUD)            

2021-2025: Adelaide Scholarship International recipient for PhD degree         

2017-2018: Australia Awards Scholarship for Masters degree, University of Queensland   

2018: Dean's Honor Roll for Outstanding Academic Excellence, University of Queensland                   

2018: Distinguished Teaching Awards of the School of Economics, University of Queensland                                                                                               

Tutor cum Teaching Assistant, The University of Adelaide

ECON 3506 - International Trade III (Undergraduate Course) [2023S1, 2025S1]

ECON 7072 - International Trade PG (Postgraduate Course) [2023S1, 2025S1]

ECON 7200: Economic Principles (M) [2025S1]

ECON 1009: International Financial Institutions and Markets I [2025S1]

 

Teaching Assistant, The University of Adelaide

TRADE 7007: MNCs, Trade & Sustainable Development [2025S1]

ECON 3501:   Development Economics III [2025S1]

ECON 3502:   Econometrics III [2023S2]

 

Tutor cum Teaching Assistant, The University of Queensland

ECON 7300 - Statistics for Business & Economics (Postgraduate Course) [2018S1, 2018S2]

Master thesis supervision, University of Moratuwa, Sri Lanka

I supervised following master theses (Capacity of principal supervisor):
1. Demographic changes and Inflation Dynamics in selected South Asian countries 
2. The Impact of Age Structural Transition on Current Account Balance for Sri Lanka 
3. An evaluation of the United States trade balance with Australia and Germany including a demographic variable

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