CLUSTERING OF CEE COUNTRIES ACCORDING TO FEA INDICATORS

Abstract

The article is devoted to the problems of development of foreign trade activity of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, the peculiarities of their socio-economic development, as well as the problems of transformation of economic systems. The aim of the study is to divide the countries of Central and Eastern Europe into groups according to foreign economic activity indicators for in-depth study of the degree of differentiation between these countries and development of recommendations for outsider countries. The relevance of the article is due to varying degrees and prerequisites development of foreign trade of Central and Eastern countries. The need to form clusters of CEE countries in terms of foreign economic activity is beyond doubt. Selecting the best cluster allows countries in the "worst" clusters to compare themselves with the leader, which, for example, will encourage the definition and achievement of foreign trade development goals by improving development strategies. The article also considers the issue of clustering of countries by indicators of foreign economic activity, such as the net trade index, export quota (indicator of economic openness), import quota, foreign direct investment as a percentage of gross domestic product; outflow of foreign direct investment as a percentage of gross domestic product; portfolio investments. The problems of differentiation between the countries of Central and Eastern Europe are also covered, the statistical analysis of the selected countries on indicators: import and export quotas are carried out, and also these data are visualized. As a result of the study using cluster analysis methods, the set of Central and Eastern European countries was divided into four clusters. The obtained data indicate a different level of economic situation in the foreign economic sphere. Only one country got into the best cluster - Hungary. Two more countries, Greece and Poland, are in the second most developed foreign trade cluster. The rest of the countries are divided between two more clusters, and Ukraine, unfortunately, is in the worst cluster together with Albania, Мoldova, Kosovo, Serbia and others.