Zmiany struktury towarowej handlu zagranicznego Polski po 1989 roku

Changes took place over the years 1989-1996 in the commodity structure of the Polish foreign trade - to a greater extent in export than in import, but altogether not very big ones. Among the most positive changes there has been an increase of exports of the commodities produced by the enterprises which took advantage of the economic transformation. On the other hand, apprehension is caused by the drastic decrease of the share of products turned out by the electric-machinery industry, and the persisting high export share of the material and labour intensive products, i.e. the ones which are processed to a limited degree. An especially disadvantageous trade structure exists in the foreign exchange between Poland and the countries of the European Union. This structure features, namely, a qualitative asymmetry, meaning the export of the primarily labour intensive goods and the import of the primarily technologically advanced (high-tech) products. The commodity structures of the foreign trade of Poland and the EU countries differ more on the export side than in terms of imports, which implies that it is more expedient to change the structure of Polish exports than of imports to Poland. In order to make the structure of Polish export more similar to the one of exports from the countries of the European Union it is necessary to make further, essential advances in the restructuring of Polish economy as such, including, first of all, the closing and then liquidation of the so called technological gap.