The Comparative Advantages in Vegetable Export of Turkey

The index of revealed comparative advantages (RCA) was first introduced by Liesner (1958) and operationalized by Balassa (1965) in order to measure comparative advantages. The RCA index of a country for a product is often measured by the product's share in the country's exports in relation to its share in world trade. The index of RCA, also called Balassa Index, is used to measure relative importance of a product in a country's export composition relative to that product's relative importance in world trade. If the index exceeds 1 the country is said to have a comparative advantage in the sector in question, since it is more important for the country's exports than for the exports of the reference countries and vice versa. In this study, between the years 1993-2012, the indices of revealed comparative advantages indices of Turkey are calculated on SITC Revision 3, 4 digit codes in order to determine comparative advantages in vegetable export in World markets. Accordingly, Turkey has a significant comparative advantage in the export of vegetable and its sub-groups in global markets. However, although comparative advantage in the export of the majority of vegetable sub-groups, the advantages have relatively been decreasing in recent years.