Future-, outside-, and inside-focused development paths

The FOI model developed by the authors measures the future, outside and inside potential of a country. With the help of the model the OECD countries are evaluated, and four typical clusters are found which can represent four typical development models within the club of developed economies

The current situation of EU’s food chain

The sharp fluctuations in agricultural commodity and food prices at a time of great uncertainty about the economic outlook illustrate the need to improve the functioning of the European food supply chain with a view to enhancing its efficiency and competitiveness. Better regulation and ensuring a vigorous and coherent enforcement of competition and consumer protection rules will contribute to limiting price increases for the benefit of European consumers, in particular lower income households. Moreover, it will also help overcome the present fragmentation of the food supply chain and remove artificial entry barriers for producers, which will help European consumers benefit from the widest possible choice of quality food products. Additionally, this could help rebalancing the bargaining power in the food supply chain. Global demand and supply developments have been one of the main determinants of the rapid increase in food prices observed. Nevertheless, problems in the functioning of the food supply chain, either in terms of the degree of competition or concerning regulation may have played an important role as well. In the present economic conditions, it is therefore particularly important to analyse how to improve the functioning of the food supply chain and, in particular, to better understand the transmission mechanisms linking commodity prices with producer and consumer prices. This would help identify appropriate measures in support of the consumer's purchasing power and the competitiveness of the sectors involved. The food supply chain connects three economically important sectors: the agricultural sector, the food processing industry and the distribution sectors. These sectors account for 6% of EU value added and 12% of EU employment. As the food processing industry and the distribution sectors have many interactions with other sectors, market malfunctioning along the food supply chain can have significant repercussions. The slow productivity growth in these sectors in comparison with the US indicates that there is room for efficiency improvements.food chain, demand and supply, retirements, consumer, foodstuff’s price, Agricultural and Food Policy,

Characteristics of the Dual Model among the OECD Countries - an FOI Model Analysis

Deciding on the development path of the economy has been a delicate question in economic policy, not least because of the trade-off effects which immediately worsen certain economic indicators as steps are taken to improve on others. The paper offers help to decide on such policy dilemmas, based on an analysis conducted among OECD countries with the FOI model (focusing on the future, outside and inside potentials). Several development models can be deduced with this method, from which only the dual model is discussed in detail. The dual model implies a development strategy focused on the attraction of outside resources, the instruments of which are also presented. The findings presented in the paper are part of a large OTKA (Hungarian Scientific Research Fund) study, which develops step by the step the methodology of the FOI model and discusses all of the development models found among OECD countries

The Role of Business Knowledge in the Internationalisation Process of Hungarian Corporations

The aim of this paper is to identify the knowledge elements that are crucial in the internationalisation process of Hungarian firms. It uses a two-dimensional model of business knowledge, which separates business knowledge along two dimensions: the tacit or explicit nature; and the codified or uncodified one. This model tells us that tacit and codified knowledge is the most difficult to transfer, while the explicit-uncodified part is the easiest. The five types of business knowledge were measured with a questionnaire. It is non-representative, filled in by 104 Hungarian firms among which the larger and more internationalised ones are overrepresented. Based on this non-representative sample we have found that the organisational beliefs and habits, and the competence of the employees are the two business knowledge elements that are most closely associated with the internationalisation of the firms. This makes it especially difficult to promote internationalisation through the transfer of knowledge, because these key knowledge elements are the stickiest, the hardest to transfer

SME Internalisation Index (SMINI) Based on the Sample of the Visegrad Countries

The goal of the chapter is to develop an index (Small and Medium-Sized Enterprise Internationalisation Index – SMINI) to measure the degree of internationalisation in the SME sector, and to uncover its most important influencing factors. The index was calculated from a data set obtained from a questionnaire conducted among 1,124 firms from the Visegrad (V4) countries, comprised of 270 Polish, 597 Czech, 113 Hungarian and 144 Slovak firms. The relationship between the index value and the influencing factors was also tested using the same dataset. The influencing factors were chosen based on a literature review. We found that the factors suggested by the literature (company size, company age, ownership structure, innovation activity, network participation and sectorial structure) have a significant effect on the SMINI, but the strength of relationship is either weak or weak to moderate. A multiway ANOVA analysis revealed that three of our variables – firm size, family ownership and innovation – have an 11.8% combined effect on the SMINI

The significance of fiscal space in Europe’s response to the crisis

The textbook response to deteriorating economic performance is monetary easing, the lowering of official interest rates. When the financial and economic crises hit Europe in 2008, however, monetary policy had very little room in most European countries, as the central bank interest rates were already pretty low. Fiscal policy instruments had to be used therefore, a branch of economic policy that was believed to be dated by many mainstream economists. In contrast to their interest rate conditions, the European countries formed a quite heterogeneous group in regard to their fiscal space: some had more because of balanced budgets and relatively low national debt ratios; others had a lot less. The paper analyses the responses given by 30 European countries to the crisis, and combines the effects with the pre-2008 fiscal characteristics. It identifies some clusters based on their performance and on their major fiscal indicators before and after the crisis

Characteristics of the Large Corporation-Based, Bureaucratic Model Among the OECD Countries - An FOI Model Analysis

Abstract Deciding on the development path of the economy has been a delicate question in economic policy, not least because of the trade-off effects which immediately worsen certain economic indicators as steps are taken to improve others. The aim of the paper is to present a framework that helps decide on such policy dilemmas. This framework is based on an analysis conducted among OECD countries with the FOI model (focusing on future, outside and inside potentials). Several development models can be deduced by this method, out of which only the large corporation-based, bureaucratic model is discussed in detail. The large corporation-based, bureaucratic model implies a development strategy focused on the creation of domestic safe havens. Based on country studies, it is concluded that well-performing safe havens require the active participation of the state. We find that, in countries adhering to this model, business competitiveness is sustained through intensive public support, and an active role taken by the government in education, research and development, in detecting and exploiting special market niches, and in encouraging sectorial cooperation.</jats:p