engleski

Competitiveness of Croatian Economy

Competitiveness can be defined as the ability to achieve success on markets, resulting in highly productive economy and the improvement in living standard of the entire population. Among over 100 countries comparing their competitive abilities in 2003 under surveillance of the World Economic Forum, Croatia took 53rd place according to the growth competitiveness ranking and 62nd place according to the business competitiveness ranking. Economic trends in Croatia were slowed down by the war activities and transition process. In spite of Croatia’ s many efforts to approach European and world integrations in recent years (signing Stabilisation and Association Agreement – SAA, and more than 30 Agreements on Free Trade), conditions and tendencies of the foreign trade exchange are not encouraging. When compared to the EU and Candidate Countries in transition, Croatian competitiveness is low. Croatian products lost their share in the EU market. The analysis showed that the most competitive advantages of Croatian manufacturers lay in fishing, tobacco products, and refined petroleum products. However, that is far from enough. Croatia should improve all economic segments to catch up with Candidate Countries. The priority is solving of export problems. Croatia needs to focus on development of technologies and innovations, and small and medium entrepreneurship in order to form market competitive products.

Croatia; Transition; Export; Competitiveness; Revealed Comparative Advantage

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