Characteristics of Croatian Manufacturing Exporters and the Export Recovery during the Great Recession – the CompNet Trade Module Research Results

This paper presents the results of an extensive investigation of Croatian firms' export distribution over the 2002-2014 period within the Competitiveness Research Network (Comp-Net). Our analysis shows that aggregate exports are concentrated in a small number of large enterprises. Furthermore, the recovery of Croatian exports after the outbreak of the global financial crisis was slow. The exports of large companies declined, while small and medium-sized companies increased their exports during the recession and drove the recovery of aggregate exports. The number of new exporters increased and their average productivity increased. Moreover, we confirm the well-known existence of a strong positive correlation between exports and productivity, as well as the superior characteristics of exporters as compared to non-exporting firms. Additionally, the results show heterogeneity across sectors and show that the average productivity premium tends to increase with the experience of the firms in the export market.