In as many as 8 major sectors of the economy, Poland has positioned itself in the EU’s TOP3 in terms of growth since 2004.
Between 2004 and 2022, Poland’s GDP doubled precisely. Only Ireland and Malta experienced faster growth during this period within the entire EU. The scale of catching up with Western Europe is well reflected in the fact that the entire EU economy grew by only 27% during the same period. Other new member states from our region also lagged far behind Poland in terms of economic growth rate.
The past 20 years have been a period of very dynamic development (multiple growth) in some service industries, especially ICT and business services for companies. One of the areas experiencing the fastest growth was industrial processing (a sector particularly exposed to international competition).
The 176% growth recorded in industrial processing was the highest dynamics in the entire European Union (excluding Ireland).
During the same period, the value added in the accommodation and catering industry, transportation and logistics, water and waste management, and construction increased by about double.
“In such service sectors as information and communication, as well as business services for companies and financial services, exports played a very important role in their growth,” says Krzysztof Mrówczyński, sector analysis manager at Bank Pekao SA, co-author of the report “20 years of Poland in the European Union from the perspective of enterprises and sectors of the economy,” in an interview with MarketNews24. “These are sectors exposed to international competition, which indicates Poland’s strengthening on the economic map of Europe.”
In all the mentioned cases (except for information and communication), Poland ranked in the top three EU countries with the strongest cumulative growth after 2004, with a significant difference (ranging from over 70 to even 160 percentage points) compared to the EU average.
On the other hand, a slight regression in real value added was noted in two sectors of the Polish economy during the period under review: the broadly understood energy sector and agriculture and forestry (the latter being the only area with worse growth dynamics than the EU average). Mining and quarrying, on the other hand, was the only area where the decline in value added after 2004 was truly significant (although still weaker than in the entire EU).
“One measure of Poland’s success over these 20 years was catching up with the Spanish economy,” comments Krzysztof Mrówczyński, an analyst at Pekao SA. “Spain is a country whose economy lost competitiveness quite significantly after the EU enlargement to new member states. In Polish industrial processing at the time of accession, value added accounted for only about 25% of Spanish processing. Currently, it’s already 75%.
We observe a similar pace of catching up in, among others, construction, information and communication services, and business services for companies.
