Agro-food trade competitiveness of Central European and Balkan countries

This paper investigates the level, composition, and differences in agro-food relative trade advantages/disadvantages for eight Central European and Balkan countries on the European Union (EU) markets and their implications for food policy. Higher and more stable relative trade advantages are found for bulk primary raw agricultural commodities and less for consumer-ready foods, implying competitiveness shortcomings in food processing and in international food marketing. Duration analysis shows that the EU enlargement has a negative impact on agro-food relative trade advantages for all eight analyzed countries. Estimations imply that the duration of agro-food relative trade advantages are the highest for Hungary and Poland, and for Bulgaria in differentiated products, indicating their agro-food trade potentials in the EU-15 markets. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.