The repository pattern is a design pattern that separates business logic from data access code, providing a unified interface for interacting with different data sources, which enhances flexibility, maintainability, and decoupling. This pattern allows the swapping of data sources without altering business logic, making code more manageable and testable. Using Python and sqlmodel, the text demonstrates this pattern with an example, defining an `Item` model and an `IRepository` interface with required methods. Two repository implementations, `SQLModelRepository` and `CsvRepository`, are showcased, illustrating how to maintain the same interface while interacting with different storage backends, namely a SQLite database and a CSV file. The example emphasizes the pattern's ability to enhance code flexibility and maintainability by allowing the data access implementation to be changed without affecting business logic, although it notes the absence of error handling for simplicity.