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Abstract
The paper investigates comparative advantages and competitiveness of Hungarian and
Slovenian agro- food trade in the EU markets. Applying a highly disaggregated trade dataset, we
describe the pattern of agro- food trade in Hungary and Slovenia using the Balassa index. The
extent of trade specialization exhibits a declining trend. Both countries have lost comparative
advantage for a number of product groups over time. The indices of specialization have tended to
converge. For particular product groups, the indices display greater variation. They are stable for
product groups with comparative disadvantage, but product groups with weak to strong
comparative advantage show significant variation. The price competition, quality competition and
the one- way trade are also analyzed using extended [1] approach. In Hungarian matched two- way
agro- food trade the prevalence is on successful price competition and on successful non- price or
quality competition suggesting comparative advantages for Hungarian agro- food product s vis- àvis
bilateral trading partners. In Slovenian matched two- way agro- food trade the prevalence is on
the non- successful price competition and on the non- successful quality competition suggesting
comparative trade disadvantages vis- à- vis bilateral trading partners .