In any case, the enlargement is a reality and as all integration processes, it involves benefits and costs to bear in mind. Among the benefits one can mention: the inclusion of new rules in the operation of the society and the economy that allow greater opportunities for initiatives and creativity, as well as the suppression of tariff barriers and the exploitation of scale economies that allow a suitable resource allocation.

But also the risks related to the appearance of structural deficits are present as a result of the commercial deficit, budgetary deficit of both national governments and the European Union, and deficit in the social cohesion process of the EU27 as a result of a greater number of population and regions with incomes far below the average.

At the micro level, one of the most worrisome problems—and perhaps the one that is of greater interest for our study—is the way in which the productive companies of these countries will respond (the majority of them are of recent creation and are modestly consolidated in terms of management background).

In this sense, it is interesting to analyze the behavior of companies from the point of their technical efficiency, as well as of their contribution to the value chain, which will allow shedding light on some conclusions on policy priorities, not only among the countries but among the productive sectors<sup>5</sup> .

The primary aim of this article is to examine the technical efficiency and its determinants in companies from the countries included in the enlargement of the EU and to know the main conditioning factors of the growth of productivity<sup>6</sup> .

In this context, a variety of features distinguish the business environment in sectors from those typically observed in the OECD. We will begin by mentioning the most remarkable and generally acknowledged among them, as identified by Tybout (1992):

- a) Market size (e.g. population and GDP). Although some economies are quite large, most are not. Hence, with the exception of countries such as Poland or Romania, the size of the domestic market for manufactured products is relatively limited. This means that the strategy of companies must be oriented towards the external sector and thus, must necessarily bear in mind the macroeconomic aspects that are translated through channels such as direct foreign investment, exchange rates and immigration.

- b) Access to manufactured inputs (e.g. merchandise imports and exports). The set of choices of domestically produced intermediate inputs and capital equipment is also often limited.

- c) Human capital (e.g. school enrollment, primary). Low rates of secondary education (less than 90%) and an insufficiency of technicians and scientists in countries like Hungary of Lithuania also affect the mix of goods manufactured and the factor proportions used to produce them.

> 5 A study on the experience of the start of the internal European market in 1993 (that had as one of its main objectives the increase in company efficiency) shows that during the 1987-1996 period, there has not been an increase in efficiency in the productive sectors of the Union. This paper argues that a possible cause of this stagnation is the possibility that the efficiency has a cyclic character and, therefore, the recession suffered in the beginning of the 90‘s could explain this situation (Esteban, Gallizo and Hernández, 2002).

> 6 In this research paper, the data of Malta and Cyprus have not been taken into consideration since they are considered as Mediterranean countries. On the contrary, data from Moldova (not in the EU) with the sole objective of homogenizing the sample of the block of countries considered as Eastern European.

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