Network analysis of the EU dairy trade

What is it about?

In this paper, we employ a novel, network analysis based approach to gain new insights with respect to the changes in the structure of intra-European Union (EU) milk product trade between 2001 and 2012. Several network indices are computed to assess the relative importance of the countries from a number of perspectives. The results emphasise that the trade network has become denser, yet it s overall centralisation slightly decreased during the period. While the impacts of the 2004 EU enlargement are clearly visible, the effects of the 2008 financial crisis are less evident. Integration of countries that joined the EU in 2004 or 2007 (the so-called New Member States, NMS) is only partial, and depends on the category of milk product considered. Although the number of NMS trade relations increased constantly between 2001 and 2012, the relative importance of most of them did not change. A significant exception is Poland, which became one of the most important exporting countries.

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Why is it important?

Over the period 2001-2012, some 90 per cent of all cow milk produced in Europe was commercialised and consumed within the EU. More importantly however, these trade relations involve rich and complex network patterns.This calls for a network analysis (NA) approach to evaluate and understand the structure and dynamics of international relationships within the EU dairy sector. In this paper, we provide a first step in this wider area.