ANALYSING ROMANIAN INDUSTRIAL COMPETITIVENESS REGARDING THE RECENT DYNAMICS OF THE INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRIAL TRADE BALANCE

Abstract

The industry remains the most important sector of the national economy, although in the other member states the services have a more important share of GDP. In this context, the level of industrial competitiveness is essential for the national competitiveness. This is a characteristic feature for Romania, where the industry has an important share in the GDP, in comparison with the other member states. The international trade balance is an important indicator for measuring the economic competitiveness, especially the industrial competitiveness. Our country has an obvious deficit regarding the international trade balance and thus the analysis of this subject is very relevant at a sectorial level and at national economy’s branches level, when identifying solutions for raising the competitiveness. This paper is dedicated to studying Romania’s industrial competitiveness analysis throughout the recent values of the imports and exports, generated by the industry and its branches. After identifying this concern utility, this article presents the methodology used, defining and experiencing the indicators proposed for characterising the level of industrial competitiveness and also the level and dynamic of the industrial trade. In the practical part of this paper, we presented the recent evolution of the values of imports and exports for the industrial products, the share of industrial sectors in the international trade balance, particularizing the manufacturing industry – the most important industrial sector – at branch level. In the analysis of the manufacturing industry we proposed a classifying methodology divided in six levels of competitiveness, associating and characterizing the branches. The conclusions present the possible solutions for improving the Romanian international industrial trade balance