CM October 2020

More documents

Recommendations

Info

COUNTRY FOCUS Poland is a perfect example of time influencing political change Mind your Language PRESENT day Poland is known for a number of things, not least of which is its food, the opening days of World War II, and where Lech Walesa, and his trade union Solidarity, opened fissures in the Communist Bloc that partly led to the downfall of the Soviet Union. But look further back in time and it becomes eminently clear that Poland in its current form is a recent construct; that its history is long and reaches back to the Iron Age. Poland is a perfect example of time influencing political change. At its zenith in the late 16th century Poland was one of the largest European powers, but it ceased to exist after 1795 following invasions and a carving up of its territory by the Russians in the east, the Prussians to the west and the Habsburgs in the south. The short-lived Second Polish Republic established after World War I ceased to exist in 1939 and come ‘liberation’ in 1945 the Soviet Union used Poland as a buffer satellite state. It wasn’t until 1989 that the Third Polish Republic came into existence and Poland became truly independent. The last 31 years have seen radical change in Poland, especially so since its accession to the European Union in 2004. And despite the politicking in recent months with regard to the presidential election where the incumbent Andrzej Duda won after a second round of voting, Poland is stable. POLAND BY NUMBERS While a country – any country – is more than its numbers, basic geographic and demographic statistics help to set the scene. Geographically, Poland is set deep in the heart of Europe. With a landmass of 312,685 km2, it’s larger than the UK with just 242,495 km2 and is ranked sixth in Europe behind France, Spain, Sweden, Germany and Finland. It’s 38.1m people put Poland in fifth place in the EU’s population table, just four places behind Germany’s 80.4m. As a comparator, the UK has around 66.6m inhabitants. Poland is highly urbanised with some 60 percent living in towns and cities. That said, Polish cities aren’t huge by UK standards. The capital Warsaw tops the list with some 1.79m residents. It is followed by Krakow with a population of 779,115, Lodz with 679,941 and Wroclaw with 642,896. Tenth in the list is Bialystok with ‘just’ 297,554 inhabitants. To make the ‘Poland stands out as a European growth champion. With an uninterrupted pace of high growth averaging 4.2 percent per annum between 1992-2019' point, Sheffield is the UK’s 10th largest city with 706,000 while London is first with around 9.3m. Unlike a number of other European countries, Poland has a strong national identity with an equally strong Polish diaspora spread around the world. According to the 2011 census, just under 97 percent of the population considers itself Polish. There’s also a multitude of ethnicities and cultural subdivisions that include Jews, Tatars, Armenians, Greeks, Germans and Vietnamese. ECONOMIC POWER A graph citing World Bank data, but published by Trading Economics, illustrates just how the Polish economy has come on since accession to the European Union. Between 1996 and 2004 its GDP hovered between $140-200bn. But the following five years saw growth rise almost exponentially to $533bn (2008) before dropping back – following the global financial crisis – to $439bn (2009). Since 2011, however, GDP has fluctuated between $528bn and $587bn. Growth has been phenomenal and as Euronews noted: ‘Poland stands out as a European growth champion. With an uninterrupted pace of high growth averaging 4.2 percent per annum between 1992-2019, Poland is steadily catching up with Western Europe and has become the seventh largest economy in the EU.’ It appears that Poland’s position is a result of a large domestic market, strong economic reform and an EU-centric set of policies. Beyond that is an entrepreneurial landscape full of SMEs and a strong competitive advantage over its European neighbours. It should be noted at this point that Poland is not only part of the EU’s external border but is also a member of the free-movement Schengen Area, the UN and NATO, the OECD, the Three Seas Initiative, the Visegrad Group and the G20. KEY SECTORS According to a June 2019 China-CEE Institute briefing, agriculture is one of the biggest sectors in the Polish economy which employs around 12.7 percent of the workforce, some 1.46m workers. But big doesn’t necessarily mean financially powerful – Eurostat data indicates that agriculture, forestry and fisheries (in 2018) created just 2.4 percent of Polish GDP. It should be said that agriculture is predominantly privately owned in the form of small farms up to five hectares. Only seven percent of privately- Advancing the credit profession / www.cicm.com / October 2020 / PAGE 24
COUNTRY FOCUS AUTHOR – Adam Bernstein owned farms are greater than 15 hectares in size. Next comes energy, trade and manufacturing. Last year (2019) Poland was the world’s 9th largest producer of coal – some 57 megatons of brown coal and 78 megatons of hard coal. While most is used domestically, renewable energy is becoming ever more important as solar, wind and hydroelectric power have each recorded significant growth in recent years. Beyond energy, comes trade and manufacturing, especially in the fields of automotive, food, metallurgy, machinery and electromechanical industry, transport, textile and clothing. Collectively these sectors employ over 31 percent – 5.25m – of all employees in Poland. While mining and mineral processing employs 82,700 workers, automotive production has around 130,000 workers and produces around 800,000 to 900,000 light vehicles a year. It accounts for 11 percent of total industrial output and about 4 percent of the country’s GDP. The automotive sector in Poland, in particular, prospered after the country became part of the European Union; its annual exports are valued at over €15.7bn or 16 percent of the country’s total exports. But in common with many developed countries, the biggest part of Polish economy is its service sector which employs around 9.46m. Apart from tourism (an understated but growing part of the economy) – this large group includes civil servants, emergency services, educationalists and the traditional service businesses such as entertainment and hospitality. It surprises many that Poland apparently sees more than 19m tourists, a number – coronavirus aside – which seems to rise every year. MARKET OPPORTUNITIES A natural question to ask is what does Poland actually import – where are the market opportunities? Data published and analysed by World’s Top Exports (which cites raw data from the US Central Intelligence Agency, the IMF and International Trade Centre), the top ten product groups in Poland’s import purchases during 2019 were, in order: machinery including computers: US$33.3bn (12.7 percent of total imports); electrical machinery, equipment: $32.3bn (12.3 percent); vehicles: $26.2bn (10 percent); mineral fuels including oil: $20bn (7.6 percent); plastics and plastic articles: $14.9bn (5.7 percent); iron and steel: $9.1bn (3.5 percent); pharmaceuticals: $7.5bn (2.9 percent); optical, technical, medical apparatus: $6.2bn (2.4 percent); articles of iron or steel: $6bn (2.3 percent), and paper and paper items: $5bn (1.9 percent). These imports accounted for over 61 percent of everything that the country bought from overseas sources. The data shows that growth categories were electrical machinery and equipment which rose by five percent from 2018 to 2019; optical, technical and medical apparatus (up by 4.3 percent) and machinery including computers (up 0.6 percent). Masuria, Poland. According to a June 2019 China-CEE Institute briefing, agriculture is one of the biggest sectors in the Polish economy which employs around 12.7 percent of the workforce, some 1.46m workers. SETTING UP SHOP As with the UK, there are a number of forms of commercial enterprise in Poland that range from the sole trader, partnerships and corporations. There is also the option for branch offices and representative offices. In summary, a sole tradership carries personal liability and requires no initial capital. The business must be registered Advancing the credit profession / www.cicm.com / October 2020 / PAGE 25 continues on page 26 >
Page 1 and 2: CREDIT MANAGEMENT CM OCTOBER 2020
Page 3 and 4: 9 FALSE DAWNS Sue Chapple FCICM CIC
Page 5 and 6: CMNEWS A round-up of news stories f
Page 7 and 8: UK workers ‘better off’ during
Page 9 and 10: FROM THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE False Dawn
Page 11 and 12: INSOLVENCY SPECIAL AUTHOR - David K
Page 13 and 14: ENFORCEMENT AUTHOR - Russell Hambli
Page 15 and 16: Advancing the credit profession / w
Page 17 and 18: CREDIT ECOSYSTEM AUTHOR - Aneesh Va
Page 19 and 20: EXCLUSIVE REPORT AUTHOR - Markus Ku
Page 21 and 22: INTERVIEW LEGALLY SPEAKING Sean Fea
Page 23: INTERVIEW AUTHOR - Sean Feast FCICM
Page 27 and 28: COUNTRY FOCUS AUTHOR - Adam Bernste
Page 29 and 30: CAREERS ADVICE OPEN ALL HOURS? What
Page 31 and 32: River deep dam high LOOK at the Ear
Page 33 and 34: ’ EXECUTIVE BOARD Debbie Nolan FC
Page 35 and 36: By delivering an approach that diff
Page 37 and 38: NEW FEATURE PANEL BASHERS Ship to S
Page 39 and 40: PAYMENT TRENDS Data supplied by the
Page 41 and 42: Each of our Corporate Partners is c
Page 43 and 44: presents
Page 45 and 46: OPINION Mind over Matter Additional
Page 47 and 48: $ Advancing Careers Advancing Best
Page 49 and 50: www.cicm.com ‘‘ Since being a m
Page 51 and 52: What impact will Crown Preference h
Page 53 and 54: HR MATTERS SEEING IS BELIEVING Comp
Page 55 and 56: BRANCH NEWS Standing out from the c
Page 57 and 58: INSPIRE ME IN THE NEW ERA OF WORK Y
Page 59 and 60: More reasons to be a member Make co
Page 61 and 62: FOR ADVERTISING INFORMATION OPTIONS
Page 63 and 64: PAYMENT SOLUTIONS American Express

CM October 2020

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?