Agricultural competitiveness: The case of the European Union countries

The paper assesses the competitiveness of agriculture of 27 countries of the European Union in the years 2009-2011. Due to the complexity of the phenomenon of competitiveness, a wide range of variables was adopted to evaluate it - including the relationship between the production factors, productivity, and the importance of agriculture in the international trade. Based on the evaluation criteria chosen for the competitiveness assessment and using the TOPSIS method, a synthetic measure of the studied phenomenon was constructed and then divided into four groups of countries similar in terms of the level of competitiveness of agriculture. The difference between the value of the synthetic measure of the country with the highest level of competitiveness of agriculture (Netherlands) and the country least competitive in this regard (Slovenia) was 3.5-fold. In addition to the Netherlands, there were classified also France, Germany, Denmark and Belgium in the first group, so the countries with high levels of the socio-economic development. In the second group, there were seven countries: Italy, the United Kingdom, Spain, Cyprus, Austria, Ireland and Luxembourg. Therefore, the first two groups are formed by the countries belonging to the so-called "Old 15" (except Cyprus). The last two groups are formed primarily by the countries that joined the European Union in 2004 or later.