Competitiveness Evaluation of Slovenian Economy

Evaluation of competitiveness became an important instrument for balancing the development process of the economy. For Slovenia it is important tool for policy creation. Benchmarking with more developed countries shows us the right directions of development process. Competitiveness can be analysed from different sides. Existed studies have focused on several different analytical levels: product, firm, industry cluster, region and nation. The most successful economies are raising the skill content of their labour force. By reducing transportation and communication costs, it links economies and societies into closer, tighter webs. It facilitates the integration of production under common ownership (transnational companies), allowing access to capital flows, world markets, skills, and technology. Competitiveness evaluation of Slovenian economy shows us that the problems remain the same during the enlargement process of the European Union. Competitiveness is defined as the quality of the economic and institutional environment for the sustainable development of private productive activities and the increise in productivity. Today we focuse more on policies and strategies on institutional and also on business level that mainatain the long-term competitiveness. Competitiveness can be seen as the collection of factors, policies and institutions which determine the level of productivity of a country and that, therefore, determine the level of prosperity that can be attained by an economy. In the paper I will evaluate the Slovenian competitiveness by SWOT analysis. After European enlargement we can see that some CEE countries have benefited more than other countries. Slovenia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia have increased the locational attractiveness for business sector and also improved the institutional competitiveness. Harmonization with EU legislation and adoption of “Acquis Communautaire” have improved the institutions and the legal system. On the other side, Croatia, Romania and Bulgaria have problems connected with the enlargement process. Because these latter countries stayed outside the first enlargement process, they have, in addition to their originally less competitive, position lower competitiveness possibilities. The integration process increased the possibilities for benchmarking. Today is more common to benchmark different countries and compare the main determinants of competitiveness. Evaluation of competitiveness is an important tool for economic policy. Slovenia as a small country can be analysed from the view of regional competitiveness. Improving competitiveness is not about driving down living standards. It is about creating a high skills, high productivity and therefore high wage economy where enterprise can flourish and where we can find opportunities rather than threats in changes we cannot avoid. Many governments seriously peruse national competitiveness rankings produced by WEF or IMD. The study of competitiveness strategy is now a very important obligation of government. All new member countries have high-level official committees to deal with competitiveness, reaching across ministerial divisions to devise international, national or regional policy.