The state of agri-food export of the Visegrad countries in EU markets

The agri-food export of the Visegrad countries has increased significantly since 2004. Since their EU accession the agri-food export of the V4 countries did not only grow – disregarding the setback in 2009 – but the EU has become their dominating market. The objective of this paper is to analyse the market position of the agri-food products of the Visegrad countries in the EU market. On the basis of the Constant Market Share (CMS) model it can be stated that in the case of each and every country the significant positive competitiveness effect, the value of which was between 58% and 70%, triggered the expansion of the agri-food export. The positive market size effect also played an important role in the growth of the export. For the Visegrad countries this meant 30–40%. However, the structural effect was negligible for each country (-1–4%). This means that the export structure of the Visegrad countries could not adjust properly to the changes of the import structure of the EU markets. On the basis of quality competitiveness the agri-food product groups of the V4 countries – with very few exceptions – have increased their market share in EU markets, which was primarily attainable because of the rising export prices. However, some achieved an increased market share with decreasing export prices.