The internationalisation of the Spanish food industry: the home market effect and European market integration

Abstract

The objective of this study was to analyse, from a long-term perspective, the factors determining the process of the internationalisation of the Spanish agrifood industry. The paper concentrates on the empirical verification of the existence of a home market effect in the food and drink industries in Spain and on the effects on trade flows of integration into the European Union. With this aim in mind, we took into account the latest contributions to the estimation of the gravity equation for a sample of export flows from 13 agrifood subsectors between 1970 and 2012, with a destination of 175 markets. From the results of the study the existence of the "home market effect" stands out as the determining factor of the increasing process of internationalisation in the majority of the subsectors of the food industry. On this point, the presence of this effect is remarkable in the most dynamic industries, where the process of restructuring caused by the development of the internal market was more intense. Furthermore, the influence of the process of European integration has been shown by the literature to be a very important factor. Our results qualify in part the results of previous studies, since the positive effect appeared later than expected. The positive effects did not appear until the completion of the process of transition by the dismantling of the barriers established in the treaty of accession to the European Union.

Networks and export performance of agri-food firms: New evidence linking micro and macro determinants

“…The limitations of being small in size, or of scarce financial, human and technical resources, have not prevented an intense process of internationalisation. (Serrano et al 2015b). Our paper has shown how the SMEs' initial limitations to taking advantage of the economies of scale could be compensated by their managers establishing collaborative networks with other firms.…”

“…This leads to the assumption that other factors besides size have helped firms to enter foreign markets in the case presented here (Serrano and Pinilla 2014). In the context of the significant restructuring process that the Spanish industry experienced in the nineties when Spain joined the European Union (Serrano et al 2015b), this paper analyses the driving force behind the export cooperation in Spanish agri-food firms using a homogenous sample, which, as Zahra and Bogner (2000) and Ojala (2009) outline, could lessen the possibility of obtaining confused or biased results. Our research highlights the firms' participation in cooperation networks as an alternative mechanism to overcome the size limitations and to improve their competitiveness in the international markets (Porter and Fuller 1986).…”

“…Progress in the international expansion of the industry is seen in both the growing intensity of the sales abroad and the rising number of the destination countries for exports (Serrano et al 2015a). From 1992, before the Spain's accession to the EU, the industry exports accelerated much faster (Serrano et al 2015b). In this period, numerous concentration processes resulted in some firms becoming larger to take advantage of the economies of scale by exploiting the geographical position of Spain as a platform to cater for the European consumers (Albisu and Gracia 2002).…”

The Role of Food Crisis and Trade Costs in the Hungarian Maize Exports

“…Having a single origin implies that the number of pairs coincides with the number of destinations. Therefore, in our case, the inclusion of a variable with a different value for each pair and constant over time can control for both multilateral resistance and unobservable heterogeneity (Serrano, García-Casarejos, Gil-Pareja, Llorca-Vivero and Pinilla, 2015).…”

Transformaciones en el sistema alimentario y cambios de dieta en España durante el siglo XX

“…La industria alimentaria española aceleró su proceso de modernización e internacionalización, aumentando la inversión extranjera y su apertura al exterior (Rama & Calatrava, 2002;Serrano et al, 2015) 13 . Se consolidó la entrada de capital extranjero en al-13.…”