Research into International Competitiveness in 2000–2008

Abstract

KTU Department of Economics and InternationalTrade carried out the research in 1999 – 2008 that createdthe background for the teaching of masters and doctors inEconomics and Management programs at the Department.In the period of 1999 – 2008 the journal “EngineeringEconomics” has accepted 85 articles, written by theresearches of the Department. All the articles may beclassified according to the fields of analysis into followingfour groups: international competitiveness of nations andcompanies; competition environment and internationaltrade features in specific industries and markets; internationalfinance and investments and risk management; economiccycles and foreign debt control.Because of the space limitations the aim of this articleis to cover the first two topics with the hope to analyze theother two in the next paper.International competitiveness of nations and companiesis discussed in 8 articles.It was found that competition intensity can bedescribed by these main factors: market shares distribution,market rate of growth, market profitability. The first factor– market shares distribution – is analyzed by usingmathematical-statistical methods, Stackelberg marketclassification and graphics market shares interpretation.The second factor – market rate of growth – can beexplained in such way: when market rate of growth higher,then market capacity is bigger, and competition is not sohigh, and vice versa. Another way for the evaluation of thesecond factor can be the concept of demand for productlife cycle. The third factor – market profitability – can beexplained in such way: when market profitability is higher,then sellers can get higher profit and this means thatcompetition of this market becomes higher. Thecompetitiveness management information systemmaintenance includes such blocks: product linedescription, market segments characteristics description,market competition intensity level, product demand lifecycle stage. Cluster based economic development is the keyto regional competitiveness. Cluster Based RegionalCompetitiveness Development Model has five stages:mobilisation, cluster development, diagnosis, collaborativestrategy and implementation.Competition environment and international tradefeatures in specific industries and markets is discussed in17 articles. It is shown that Baltic States are competingexporters of similar sectors of commodities. While demandin Eastern markets is shrinking, export conditions to theEU countries are getting more attractive. This encouragesBaltic States exports to the EU. Lithuania is exportingmineral products, textiles and textile article, machinery,mechanical appliances and electrical equipment, productsof chemical industries. Latvia and Estonia keep strongexport positions in these sectors too. The EU internalmarket is supposed to be an area without any tradebarriers, but there is still much to do achieving reallyunhampered flow of goods and services in Europe. It wasfound that the legal basis of the EU permits the possibilityto misuse health and safety requirements as a hamper offull economic integration of the expanding EU family.