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Defining and measuring resilience has become a subject of interest in a world characterized by crises. Calls for empirical work on the microeconomic drivers of the resilience of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have drawn attention to the need for an enterprise resilience index. This paper fills this gap by proposing a multi-dimensional framework for firm resilience. Factor analysis of firm level data from surveys conducted in Cambodia and the Philippines before and during the COVID-19 crisis identifies a set of firm-level factors that drove successful SME performance during the pandemic. Structural Equation Modelling combines these factors into a firm level resilience index and confirms that the index is positively correlated with commonly used proxies of firm performance during crises, such as retaining employees. The insights from the analysis indicate that investment in certain dimensions of firm performance in good times can drive their resilience during crises.

Supplementary Material 1

This paper uses firm-level data to study the pricing-behavior of Tanzanian exporters. The important question of how exporting firms make pricing decisions has not received significant attention in the trade literature, which is more focused on factors that determine export flows. The results of the paper show that the free on board price of Tanzanian exports is differentiated both across exporters -- within product-destination pairs -- and across markets -- within firm-product pairs. Moreover, contrasting with existing evidence, price differentiation across destinations seems to be mainly relevant for homogenous goods. This result could indicate either that goods classified as homogeneous can potentially be differentiated by their intrinsic quality (such as coffee), or that firms charge different mark-ups in different markets. Although further work is needed to confirm what leads to price dispersion, allowing for the possibility that food products can be vertically differentiable amplifies the spectrum of existing opportunities for developing countries to exploit product differentiation and market niches. The study also discusses the implications of the empirical findings in light of the predictions of price and quality competition models, but finds that the results cannot be explained by a single trade model of quality or price competition.

Argentinean export growth was impressive during the recent economic boom (2003-2007). However, decomposing export growth reveals that the extensive margin (increases in exports of existing products to existing markets) dominates, while the intensive margin (increases in exports of new products or new markets) contributes little to export growth. Argentina's trade product concentration has increased in the past 10 years, and the main export products remain overwhelmingly natural-resource intensive. The little diversification of non-primary exports limits the country’s ability to weather a decline in export commodity prices. The country has had some success finding new export markets, especially in Latin America, but should seek to develop deeper trade relationships with high GDP export destinations such as the European Union and the United States. Another challenge going forward is the relatively low sophistication of exports and limited integration into the global production chains, falling behind regional competitors such as Brazil. This calls for policy measures to improve the ability of existing firms to innovate and compete successfully in global markets.