Competitiveness : the case of Greek food manufacturin

While there is much agreement on the economic and social importance of competitiveness, it is less clear what exactly competitiveness is and what its most important determinants are. The aim of this paper is first to present an extensive literature review relative to the question under investigation. Second this study aims to presents the competitiveness in Greek Food and Beverage industry by comparing the mean values of growth and profitability in each of the ten sectors with the mean values of growth and profitability for the whole Greek economy sectors. Finally uses as main competitive indicators firm profitability and growth in order to investigate the relative importance of both firm specific characteristics (eg. size, past profitability, growth, financial ratios) and industry characteristics (e.g.industry growth) on competitiveness of Greek food and beverage manufacturing firms. The empirical work is based on financial data of 300 food manufacturing firms. The financial data set covers the period 2003-2007. The Fixed Effects method is used to estimate the coefficients of the specified empirical model using time series cross-section panel data. This study contributes to the literature on the discussion of the indicators of competitiveness and factors affecting competitiveness, especially in case of Greek food and beverage firms.