Caractéristiques et performances des firmes exportatrices françaises

This paper investigates the relationship between export and productivity on a panel of 23000 French manufacturing firms over the period 1990-2002. Exporting firms are found to be larger, more capital intensive and more productive than non-exporting firms. This export premium echoes those recently found for other OECD countries. However, French manufacturing firms reveal two peculiar features. First, their average export intensity is low, especially within the group of the Small and Medium Size Firms, whereas their participation to export markets is relatively large as compared to other European countries. Second, the productivity advantage of exporting firms does not predate entry into export markets. Rather, French exporting firms displays above average productivity levels because of post-entry gains linked to learning effect. Those productivity gains become larger as the firm devotes a larger share of its sales to export. JEL Codes: F10, L60, D24.