Are new EU member states catching up with older ones on global agri-food markets?

Abstract

This article investigates price and quality competitiveness and comparative advantage in the new and old European Union member states' agri-food trade on the global market between 2000 and 2011. The empirical results show that the new and old member states have become more similar in successful agri-food competitiveness and comparative advantages. The shares of successful price and successful quality competition were greater in the structure of the two-way matched agri-food trade than the shares of unsuccessful price and unsuccessful quality competition. Only the one-way export share or the one-way import share was less important in their agri-food trade structures. Successful price competition and successful quality competition were consistent with revealed comparative advantage as confirmed by the duration analysis.

Acknowledgements

This article was generated as part of the COMPETE Project, Grant Agreement No. 312029 (http://www.compete-project.eu/), with financial support from the European Community under the 7th Framework Programme.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.