Modern Directions of Ensuring the Competitiveness of Agricultural Products of Ukraine

Abstract

Competitiveness should be understood as the ability of an individual entity to function successfully in a competitive environment, having an absolute or relative advantage over the “main players” – key competitors in the market. It is determined that the competitiveness of products is associated with the appropriate level of its quality, which is better than analogues to meet the needs of consumers. Another component is the cost of products, the nature of which is more variable compared to quality, which explains the formation of quality throughout the production cycle under the influence of mostly objective factors. The cost of production, which consists of cost and profit, has a higher level of variability due to the dependence of the level of profit on the state of market demand. In terms of profit, the competitiveness of products is closely linked to the success of the enterprise, its stability and development potential. Another aspect of product competitiveness is considered market parameters. Thus, “hard” and “soft” factors of product competitiveness were distinguished, where the first group is represented by the quality and cost of production, and the second – profit and marketing. The analysis of the existing criteria of competitiveness of goods allowed to add to the identified factors the following: social targeting, consumer novelty, informativeness, reliability, safety for consumers and the environment, product image. Features of ensuring the competitiveness of products in the agricultural sector are considered. The dependence of agricultural specialization on the location determines the critical dependence of product quality on the resource potential, which requires preservation and reproduction. This necessitates the inclusion of environmentally responsible components of responsible land use in the ways of ensuring the competitiveness of products. It is determined that the most difficult factor in managing the competitiveness of agricultural products is the price due to the peak load in the collection of crops and the need for significant storage reserves for storage of products for a long time. Ways to manage this factor are proposed to consider the development of commodity exchanges, the use of financial instruments, risk insurance. Horizontal integration for small farms and vertical integration for agricultural enterprises are recognized as additional ways to ensure the competitiveness of agricultural products.