Midlands State University Library

Trade collapse, quality and food exports

CURZI, D

Trade collapse, quality and food exports - Applied Economics Letters Volume , number , .

This article revisits the so-called ‘Collapse in Quality’ hypothesis, according to which, during the 2008–2009 crisis, higher quality goods experienced a stronger export reduction compared to low-quality ones. Using disaggregated trade data from three European countries that traditionally export high-quality food products – France, Italy and Spain – we do not find any econometric evidence supporting this hypothesis. In contrast, we provide preliminary evidence for the concurrent hypothesis, namely that firms reduced their markup to preserve market share.


2008 - 2009 crisis
trade collapse
food quality