Italian Trade Specialization: Persistence and Change in Regional Agri-Food Production

M. PlataniaP. RapisardaM. Rizzo


No 4/2015, December
pp. 101-109

Platania, M., Rapisarda, P. and Rizzo, M. (2015) “Italian Trade Specialization: Persistence and Change in Regional Agri-Food Production”, AGRIS on-line Papers in Economics and Informatics, Vol. 7, No. 4, pp. 101 - 109, ISSN 1804-1930.

Abstract

The Italian agri-food sector has traditionally been one of the strongest in the national socio-economic system. In the last ten years, commercial exchange trends have shown growing openness towards foreign countries and in particular to European Union (EU) countries. Both the primary sector and food industry are strongly influenced by their territorial location so much so that several authors have highlighted territorial specialisation and its effects on that territory’s features also considering the contribution of the Italian Regions. The following work will analyse the patterns of agri-food specialisation in the Italian Regions. In particular, the Lafay Index will be used to evaluate competitive advantage at a Regional level.

Keywords

Agricultural trade. Lafay Index. Comparative advantage. Regional specialization.

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