Improving Competitiveness of Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SMEs) in Agriproduct Export Business Through ANP: The Turkey Case

Abstract

Agricultural production has considerable potential in Turkey. Different regions of the country are able to supply a variety of agricultural products due to the wide-range of climate conditions and high land quality. Also, the majority of the water resources in the region are located within the country. Hence, with the implementation of the effective agricultural policies, agricultural products can be significantly increased in terms of quality and quantity. In this context, this study investigates findings from an explanatory study of dried fruit production and exports to improve SMEs' competitiveness in the agriproduct export business. Turkey reported a trade deficit equivalent to USD 7533 million in November of 2011, and this shortfall is becoming more threatening day by day. Because Turkey has a comparative advantage in the dried food industry, it would be valuable to conduct a study to present a management decision tool to determine which factors are more important and to identify the weights that are most significant for dried fruit exporters. The analytical network process (ANP) method was selected to solve the problem because it has been successfully used to evaluate the factors when interdependency exists in between the decision criteria. The contributions of the study could be extended to other sectors and problem areas of business management because the approach, model, and methodology can be easily adopted by practitioners. (C) 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.