Despite a decreased share of gross domestic product, the role of a country’s food and beverage industry cannot be underestimated. Food security should be a crucial part of national policy in every country because, during critical situations, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, it plays a key role in the protection of a country’s citizens. The food industry also plays a key role in employment and the sustainable development of all countries. We investigated the latest trends and focused on one specific branch of the food industry. Although the spirits industry does not have a major market share in the food industry, it is one of the branches with the highest added value, and it produces commodities with high export potential. This branch of the food industry in the Slovak Republic has a long tradition. Our primary aim was to examine the competitiveness of this sector in a single market of the EU as a key element of its sustainable development. The results obtained for the revealed comparative advantage suggest that there was a downturn in the number of competitive branches in the Slovak spirits industry during the study period of 2004–2018. Despite this negative trend, the remaining competitive branches of the Slovak spirits industry represent the majority of exports.

New Member States have been part of the Single market since joining the European Union in 2004. This step brought various challenges in each of these countries because of appreciable difference in competitiveness compared to old EU Member States. This article puts to the test the competitiveness of the Czech meat industry. This is one of the most important parts of the agri-food production, which is still a very important part of regional economics in less developed regions. Thus, it represents cultural heritage of the countryside. The main aim is to investigate specific branches of the Czech meat industry according to their competitiveness on the Single market. In the article, we make conclusion on different states of the competitiveness of three main branches of the Czech meat industry, which represents 85.6% of the overall meat export. Conducted research provided information on positive change in the export during the observed period of time, but the comparison of absolute export and import numbers did not refer to a positive development of the Czech meat industry. Furthermore, we observed tendency to locate meat production near local markets and in developed regions.

One of the main tasks of controlling is to identify the deviations of actually achieved results compared to the planned and to find out reasons for their occurrence. Lack of attention to this activity can have negative impact on the company's performance. The paper focuses on identification of selected research results that was conducted in Slovak agricultural enterprises. The main goal of the paper is to evaluate and analyse the approach of agricultural enterprises in Slovakia to the implementation of deviations analysis. The basic technique applied for data collection was a questionnaire survey, which was supplemented by a direct interview with managers of selected agricultural entities. The implementation of the questionnaire survey was preceded by a pre-research (pilot study) carried out in the Czech Republic. Obtained data were statistically examined applying the XLStat statistical program. Based on achieved research results we confirmed presumptions from the theoretical background elaborated in the paper, stating that the analysis of deviations is an integral part of controlling. Furthermore, we identify problematic areas for deviations analysis and also controlling implementation in agricultural enterprises in Slovakia.

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