Abstract:

This paper aims at assessing the competitiveness and innovativeness practices of large food industry firms in Turkey. In this study data were collected from 23 of 80 large food firms (ISIC 311–313) in Turkey using a questionnaire. Our findings show that most of the firms in the industry prefer to adopt cost leadership strategy. Among the five competitive priorities, quality is the most important one followed by cost, innovation, reliability and flexibility. During the survey period, the innovation levels of firms are not high. In the same period, production methods had the highest score of innovation. As expected firms focused on improvement activities rather than basic and practical research. Similarly, companies emphasized on improving existing products rather than developing a new product. Entering new markets came out as the most important reason for firms engage in innovation activities.

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