Regional productivity growth in the EU since 2000: something is better than nothing

Abstract

This paper examines productivity growth across NUTS 2-regions in the EU during the period in which the Lisbon Strategy was rolled out (period 2000-2011). A robust non-parametric production frontier estimation technique is used to estimate and decompose regional productivity growth. Results show that in spite of the increased focus on improving competitiveness and productivity in European programs such as the Lisbon Agenda, regional productivity growth has been relatively limited for the whole EU. However, behind the modest average regional growth rate, there are high interregional differences in growth rates. Results also show evidence of a limited convergence trend in the EU-region since 2000.

Addressing spatial dependence when estimating technical efficiency: A spatialized data envelopment analysis of regional productive performance in the European Union

“…The research suggests that the spatial distribution of efficiencies could play a fundamental role in the competitiveness of the European regions, having importance for the spatial design of the European policy in terms of regional development and productivity. In addition, there is an economic rationale behind our results that is coherent with the empirical analyses carried out previously in terms of regional productivity and convergence for the case of world countries (Badunenko et al., 2013, 2018; Henderson & Russell, 2005) or the European regions (Rogge, 2019), shedding light on the causes of the observed regional performance inside the EU.…”

“…This is a new finding for the European regional case that could be related to the detected multimodal distribution in European regional productivity. For example, the kernel distributions of the regional efficiencies estimated by Rogge (2019) across NUTS‐2 regions in the EU for the years 2000 and 2011 demonstrate that the distribution of regional productivity was multimodal but did not detect the existence of multimodality in the distribution of efficiency scores. The failure to detect this characteristic could be the result of the aspatial nonparametric production frontier technique used by the author to estimate the scores.…”

“…In recent decades, applied researchers have become increasingly interested in the analysis of efficiency across regional economies in order to determine whether or not the use of regional factor endowments is contributing to regional convergence (Maudos et al., 2000; Ramajo & Hewings, 2018; Rogge, 2019). This interest is related to the important role that changes in efficiency could have on changes in productivity (Solow, 1957) affecting the regional convergence process.…”

Spatio-sectoral heterogeneity and population–employment dynamics: some implications for territorial development

“…In analyses of regional economic development, productivity has always occupied a central place (63; 21), since within-country differences in regional productivity could be the main reason why some regions are less developed (53). In order to promote regional productivity, rigorous research is required at the regional level on which to base structural policies in accordance with the conditions established by local socio-economic, demographic and labour market factors (60).…”

An empirical study of information technology clusters and regional economic growth in Russia

“…Regional economic growth is a relevant studies trend [1]. Issues related to the relationship between the economic growth and development of information technologies in separate countries and regions are also the subject of many scientific studies [2,3,4,5,6].…”