Evolution Characteristics and Influencing Factors of Global Dairy Trade

There are imbalances and uncertainties in the global supply and demand of dairy products, owing to the adverse influence of overall economic changes, dairy prices, agricultural politics, the COVID-19 pandemic, and severe climate. This paper aims to explore the evolving characteristics and influencing factors of the global dairy trade pattern and make recommendations for the sustainable development of the global dairy trade. This paper studies the evolutionary characteristics of the global dairy trade pattern from the perspective of the overall structure, individual characteristics, and core–periphery structure through complex network analysis (CNA), using the countries involved in dairy trade from 2000 to 2020. Furthermore, this study explores the influencing factors of the dairy trade network using a quadratic allocation procedure (QAP). The results indicate that the global dairy trade network has been expanding, with prominent scale-free features and small-world characteristics. Individual countries display obvious heterogeneity, whereas the core import regions of the dairy shift from Europe, East Asia, and America to North America, the Middle East, and East Asia. Contrary to this, there is no significant change in the core export regions. Consequently, the entire dairy trade network represents a clear core–periphery structure. Moreover, the income per capita gaps, geographic distance gaps, and common language always affect the trade value and dairy trade relations across the countries. Meanwhile, economic level gaps and regional trade agreements have become increasingly significant. Thus, the dairy trade may not follow the “border effect”. Lastly, this paper also extends recommendations for the sustainable development of the dairy trade.