Regional impacts of the EU Rural Development Programme: Poland's food processing sector

The paper illustrates the application of the regional quasi-experimental estimation approach to estimate impacts of the Rural Development Programme (RDP) on the performance of the food processing sector in Poland. It brings several advantages compared with estimations based on firm data by capturing the RDP effects on non-supported firms and measures targeting overall development of rural areas; it provides a more accurate aggregate regional policy impacts; and it partially addresses the bias caused by general equilibrium effects. The application of the approach to Polish regional data shows that the RDP impacts structural change and employment in the food processing sector in Poland.