82 International Forestry Review Vol.15(1), 2013

Regional shifts of employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industriesT. OSSES, U. KIES and A. SCHULTE

Wald-Zentrum, Westfälische-Universität Münster, Hafenweg 24a, 48155 Münster Germany

Email: tatiana.osses@wald-zentrum.de

SUMMARY

Wood-based panels, produced from primary processing of raw timber, are a major input for furniture. Both industries form an important produc-tion chain in Europe’s forest-based sector and face on-going structural changes induced mainly by technological innovation, expansion and relocation in the context of a growing global competition. In an exploratory shift-share analysis, the study investigates these changes and their effects on employment in the two interconnected industries across the European countries from 1999 to 2007. The results reveal opposite growth trends in Western and Eastern countries, as well as dynamic restructuring processes especially in the Eastern industries. Western countries lose employees on a large scale for the sake of new emerging jobs in Eastern countries, however on a smaller scale. The major shifts are induced by widespread outsourcing, relocation and downsizing trends and it can be shown that the regional availability of skilled, low cost labour and raw wood material represent the key locational factors in the wood-based panel and furniture industries. The study highlights regions where wood-based panel and furniture industries in neighbouring Western and Eastern countries clearly interact. The findings of cross-regional employment shifts can help to inform regional policies for sustainable development of Europe’s forest-based sector from a macroeconomic and social perspective.

Keywords: forest sector, wood-based panels, furniture, wood supply chain, shift-share analysis

Délocalisations régionales de l’emploi dans les industries de panneau en bois et d’ameublement européens.

T. OSSES, U. KIES et A. SCHULTE

Le panneau en bois, fabriqué dans la première transformation du bois brut, représente un produit de base important pour l’ameublement. Les deux industries constituent une chaine de production importante dans la filière forêt-bois en Europe et sont confrontées avec un changement des structures majeur entrainée par l’innovation technologique, expansion et délocalisation dans un contexte de compétition mondiale en crois-sance. A travers d’une analyse ‘shift-share’ de ce pair d’industries dans le pays européens pendant la période de 1999 à 2007, l’étude examine ces changements et leurs effets sur l’emploi. Les résultats montrent des tendances de croissance opposées dans les pays d’ouest et d’est, et aussi un processus de restructuration dynamique en particulier dans les pays d’est. Les pays d’ouest perdent de l’emploi à grande échelle pen-dant que de nouvel emploi émerge dans les pays d’est, mais à une échelle moins importante. Les plus grandes délocalisations sont déclenchées par des tendances répandues en externalisation, déplacements des usines et dégraissage des effectifs. Les résultats démontrent que la dis-ponibilité de la main-d’œuvre qualifiée à bas prix et de la matière première en bois représentent les facteurs clé de localisation dans les industries de panneau en bois et d’ameublement. L’étude fait ressortir des régions où les deux industries interagissent entre des pays voisins d’ouest et d’est. Ces résultats concernant les délocalisations interrégionales de l’emploi peuvent soutenir d’une perspective macroéconomique et sociale les politiques régionales pour le développement durable de la filière forêt-bois.

Cambios regionales en el crecimiento del empleo en las industrias de paneles de madera y mueble en Europa.

T. OSSES, U. KIES y A. SCHULTE

Los paneles de madera, producidos a partir de la transformación primaria de la madera en bruto, son un input significativo para el mueble. Ambas industrias son una importante cadena de producción de la industria forestal en Europa y se enfrenta actualmente a cambios estructurales inducidos principalmente por la innovación tecnológica, la expansión y deslocalización en el contexto de la creciente competencia mundial. A través del análisis “shift-share” de este par de industrias en los países europeos desde 1999 hasta 2007, el estudio investiga estos cambios y sus efectos sobre el empleo. Los resultados revelan tendencias de crecimiento opuestos en los países del Oeste y Este, así como procesos dinámicos de reestructuración, especialmente en las industrias del Este. Los países del Oeste pierden puestos de trabajo en gran escala mientras, nuevos puestos de trabajo emergen en los países del Este, sin embargo a menor escala. Los principales cambios son inducidos por las tendencias

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 83

generalizadas de subcontratación laboral, deslocalización y reducción de personal, mostrando que la disponibilidad de mano de obra calificada y de bajo costo local y la madera como materia prima, representan los principales factores de localización de las industrias de paneles de madera y muebles. El estudio destaca las regiones donde las dos industrias claramente interactúan en los países vecinos del Oeste y el Este. Estos resultados sobre los cambios interregionales del empleo puede apoyar al diseño de políticas regionales para el desarrollo sustentable del sector forestal Europeo desde una perspectiva macroeconómica y social.

INTRODUCTION

Europe is one of the principal producers and consumers of forest-based products in the world. The forest-based sector, also termed the “forest cluster” (Kies et al. 2009, Lammi 1996), embraces a number of interrelated wood and paper-based production chains which all depend on the raw material wood and hence on the regional resource forest. In 2007, the European wood manufacturing sector (including wood, paper, printing, furniture) comprised about 590 000 enter-prises and 5.2 million employees, generated sales of around 721 000 � million and an aggregate value of 221 600 � mil-lion. In relative terms it thus accounts for around 15% of total manufacturing (Eurostat 2011 a).

A major production chain within this sector connects wood-based panel industries with furniture industries: pro-duced from primary processing of raw timber, wood panels represent a major input for furniture, which is largely based on wood, even though other materials are also important. It is estimated that in 2006, 63% of furniture sales in Europe corresponded to wood-based furniture. Wood-based panels are semi-finished products used predominantly as intermedi-ate products in furniture manufacturing or construction. With 68.7 million m³ annual production in 2007, of which 75% is produced in Western Europe, the EU is the second producer worldwide for wood-based panels after Asia. The principal products are particle boards with 44.9 million m3 (65% of total), fibreboards with 17.7 million m3 (26%), plywood (7%) and veneer sheets (2%). The two main types of panels used in furniture are particle boards and medium-density fibreboards (MDF). Of these the European furniture industry consumes 55% of total production (Barbu 2011, Buehlmann et al. 2000, Carlsson-Aubry and Castronovo 2008, Eurostat 2012 a, FAO 2008, Rebollar et al. 2007, UNECE/FAO 2011).

The wood-based panel and furniture value chain is increasingly influenced by globalization: developed econo-mies are aware of losing competitiveness in wood-based man-ufacturing in relation to transition and developing economies. The global increase of imports from low-cost producers such as China and South-East Asian countries have lead to signifi-cant losses in employment during the last decade in wood processing and furniture industries across the U.S. and Europe. Besides, Europe’s wood industries face on-going structural changes induced mainly by technological innova-tion, expansion and relocation of production, first of all to the new member states and neighbouring countries of the EU. The German reunification in 1990 and the subsequent politi-cal inclusion of Eastern countries into the EU between 2004

and 2007 have lead to a new emergence and unique dynamic of wood-based industries in Eastern Europe. Innovation as a strategy has gained in importance to adapt to the growing competition and new markets. Large European manufacturers of kitchen and office furniture have outsourced the production of components to new EU member states and focused inter-nally on larger value adding. Overall, the output in furniture grew considerably in Eastern European countries, while West-ern countries lost ground (Clutier et al. 2007, Drayse 2011, Hansen 2010, Hanzl and Urban 2000, ITC and ITTO 2005, Kaplinsky et al. 2008, La Bissoniere et al. 2006, Poliakov et al. 2009, Quesada et al. 2006).

Therefore the presentation of this global trend in Europe is relevant to create regional policies for sustainable develop-ment of European wood-based industry, integrating the economic, environmental and social components.

The dynamic changes observed over the last decade moti-vated this study to focus on shifts in employment across the EU, which has not been investigated yet in detail, and is unknown to industry members and the regions’ representa-tives. The objective of this study is to consistently analyse and compare the regional differences in employment shifts of Europe’s wood-based panel and furniture production chain, namely how and to what extent Eastern and Western countries have been affected by the process of economic transforma-tion. The hypothesis is that employment developed differently in Western and Eastern Europe and that considerable shifts from Western to Eastern Europe occurred. The purpose is to highlight countries in the European context with advantages (or disadvantages) for the development of these both indus-tries as well as to provide a global view of the major trends in this production chain.

These variations are studied here using the shift-share methodology, a widely used explorative tool in macroeco-nomics and regional industrial dynamics. The analysis focuse s on the evolution of employment in the member states of the European Union, specifying differential effects of these changes in Western and Eastern Europe and decomposing these shifts into national growth effects and regional com-petitive effects (Jackson and Haynes 2009, Kies et al. 2010, Klein et al. 2008). This paper first describes the shift share methodology and the underlying data. Second, the results on regional dynamics are presented separately for the wood-based panel industry and the furniture industry. Third, the overall effect of the combined industries production chain is investigated. Finally the results are discussed in the light of regional trends and factors.

84 T. Osses et al.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

Regional shift-share analysis

Shift-share analysis (SSA) emerged in the 1960s as a method for analysing indicators of regional productivity and employ-ment dynamic. Regional growth depends on advantages (or disadvantages) within a national context, which generates industrial differences among regions. The model examines economic change of a region by decomposing it into three additive components: a reference area component (national share: NS), a proportionality shift (industry mix: IM) and a differential shift (regional share: RS) (Dinc et al. 1998, Dunn 1960). It is a widespread technique in the field of regional studies owing to its convenient calculation and logical, straightforward interpretation (Cörvers and Meriküll 2007, Kies et al. 2010, Maudos et al. 2008, Polése and Shearmur 2006). Judicious use requires a good understanding of the method’s strengths and limitations: SSA is a descriptive tool, which effectively reveals regional change patterns relative to a reference region benchmark, yet it does not explain underly-ing factors of growth. Various modifications and extensions of the method have emerged (e.g. Jackson and Haynes 2009, Mayor and Lopez 2009, Zaccomer 2006), yet it is however acknowledged that the standard model first introduced by Dunn (1960) remains a valid analytical tool that can adequate-ly present general differential effects (Dinc et al. 1998, Stimson et al. 2006). The procedure is technically simple and uncomplicated data requirements, making the resulting analysis a good tool for exploratory targeting of regional industrial dynamics, in our case from a European perspective (Blien and Wolf 2002, Esteban 2000, Kies et al. 2010, Klein et al. 2009).

The conventional model decomposes a region’s total shift observed over a time interval into three components (Formula 1):

+ + + + +

∆ = − + − + −����� ������� �������

t t t t tt t tn in n ir in

ir ir ir irt t t t tn in n ir in

E E E E EE E E E

E E E E E

1 1 1 1 1

NS IM RS

1

(1)

Regional employment is analysed in reference to a major area, where E is the number of persons employed, i is the industry (NACE REV 1.1: D20.2 and D 36.1), r is the region (countries of the EU); n is the reference area (nation, the EU); t is the reference point in time (starting year); and t+1, is the comparison point in time (end year).

The National Share (NS) is the part of the region’s total shift in employment (∆E) to be expected if major parts of its economy (e.g. major industries or sectors) would have changed at the same rate as the national economy. The Indus-trial Mix (IM) is the part of regional change that is expected assuming the industry under study grew at the same rate as on national level. The Regional Share (RS), depicts the change that cannot be explained by either general or industry-specific tendencies and which is therefore specifically regional, point-ing at local to regional (dis)advantageous locational factors

and competitiveness. This effect is often considered the most important component in terms of regional development. Further details about the method are found in Dinc et al. (1998). A first SSA example of wood-based industries is found in Klein et al. (2009).

Analysis setup

For the purpose of this SSA, countries are designated as regions and the European Union as the reference area. Thus the performance of each country as well as the interplay between countries in the EU context is analysed. Besides the two separate subgroups of Western EU and Eastern EU countries (new member states and/or transitional countries) are examined.

The analysis is based on EUROSTAT Structural Business Statistics, which relate to the official NACE classification of industrial sectors (EUROSTAT 2002, 2011 a). The NACE underwent considerable revision in 2008 (Rev. 1.1 to Rev. 2) to reflect more adequately the industrial change. However, as a consequence of redefining industry sectors, the former and the new revision show limitations in class comparability. To exclude the problem of statistical classification breaks, this time series analysis used a homogeneous, comparable dataset from 1999 to 2007 based on NACE Rev. 1.1 of 2002.The dataset collects statistical information on the number of per-sons employed (variable code V16110, here in short: employ-ees), number of enterprises (code V11110) and total turnover (code V12110) in the wood-based panel industries (DD 20.2) and furniture industries (DN 36.1) across the individual 27 member countries of the European Union, including Norway (non EU member state). DD 20.2 comprises the manufacture of veneer sheets, plywood, laminboard, particle board, fibre-board and other panels and boards. Employment data for the subgroups of DD 20.2 are not available in EUROSTAT. DN 36.1 includes the manufacture of chairs and seats, office and shop furniture, kitchen furniture, other furniture, and mattresses (mattresses are clearly non-wood-based, yet they represent only 3% of the total persons employed and are therefore negligible).

Data gaps for initial years or years within the time series are estimated using linear interpolation, trend extrapolations and estimation in proportion to higher divisions (e.g. D20 and D36). Overall data gaps represent but 10% of total number of field values in wood-panel industry and 8% in furniture indus-try. The small countries Cyprus, Malta and Luxembourg are excluded due to insufficient data for the survey. Over the nine year period from1999 to 2007, both industries showed homogeneous trends in employment, allowing for a method-ologically consistent SSA. Both industries belong to the Man-ufacturing section (NACE D), so their growth was compared in relation to the overall producing industries (NACE C-F).

The effects of price inflation during the period are consid-ered through adjustment of the turnover figures to the base year 1999 using national inflation rates (EUROSTAT 2011 b). The analysis focuses on the employment’s total shifts (TS) and regional shares (RS) across the EU countries and the

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 85

aggregated sub-regions Western and Eastern Europe. Further-more indices for industry size structure (employees per enter-prise: EpE) and productivity (turnover per employees: TpE) are considered. Besides absolute figures, the relative changes are investigated to allow for comparison between countries of different geographical and socio-economic size. The RS in absolute figures was compared to the number of employees at the beginning of the period (i.e. 1999) to derive a percentage deviation, which is an indication of the RS’s potential to influ-ence the total shift. The results are represented as two distinct graphs per each industry and one combined graph, which group the countries into West and East, ordered by the total shift. A short appendix documents the detailed result of the shift share analysis and the EpE and TpE indices (Table 3: wood-based panel; Table 4: furniture industry).

RESULTS

Regional trends in the wood-based panel industry

In 2007 the European wood-based panel industry accounts for a total of 2 600 enterprises and 123 000 employees. The larg-est countries in absolute employees figures are Germany (16 700), Poland (14 400), Spain (13 100) and Italy (11 600). The smallest countries are Ireland (800) and the Netherlands (300). The industry generated a total turnover of about 27.4 billion � (bn �), with large shares of Germany (6.5 bn �), Spain (3.2 bn �) and Italy (3.1 bn �). The countries with low-est turnover (less than 0.18 bn �) are the Netherlands, Estonia, Slovenia and Lithuania. Between 1999 and 2007 the indus-try’s TS in Europe figures −14 000 or −10% of employees (Table 1). The relative changes in Western and Eastern Europe are more or less equal. However, significant trend are observed in the employment structure. Eastern enterprises show an average 1.4 times higher EpE and a four times lower TpE productivity compared to the West. In the West the EpE

increases by +6% and TpE by +42%, while in the East the EpE increases by +8% and the TpE by +87%. Clearly, eastern enterprises are more dynamic and gradually converging towards the enterprise structure in the West.

The SSA identifies considerable differences in country trends (Figure 1, appendix Table 3). NS and IM play only a minor role (−7% and −3% of the TS respectively) and it is evident that the RS is the decisive component in the TS, be it positive or negative. In the positive case, it mitigates or reverses a negative shift that would have occurred in a regional industry had it matched the overall rate of decline in the branch and the general economy. In the negative case, it further intensifies a regional decline. Thus the RS highlights countries, which gain (or loose) employees due to locational (dis)advantages. In Western Europe, the major losses occur in Germany (TS: −4 500 or −21%) and the United Kingdom (TS: −2 900 or −39%; RS: −2 200 or −29%). In the country group of Germany, Finland, France, Portugal and Denmark, the average RS is −9%. A contrasting trend is observed in Spain, Austria and Belgium, which show strong positive RS of + 20% to + 45%, inducing positive TS. Italy, one of the four largest countries, is marked by a high positive RS (+800), which counterbalances the impact of general and specific trends and minimizes employment losses (TS only −360 or −3%).

In Eastern Europe, Slovakia shows the largest decrease (−1 500 or −43%) that are mainly a result of negative regiona l conditions (RS: −1 170 or −33% of the TS). Likewise Hungary decreases by −885 or −35% employees induced by negative regional factors (RS: −631 or −25%). Employment losses of Slovenia and Romania are however principally induced by the national specific trends. Lithuania is a special case, because losses here are completely induced by national and industry specific trends. In contrast, positive influences of the RS are identified for, Bulgaria, Estonia, and Poland (+12% to +25%).

The absolute figures of the TS and RS show contrasting trends across countries, yet the comparison of the sub-regions

TABLE 1 Shifts of employment of wood-based panel and furniture industries in Western and Eastern Europe, 1999–2007

IndustryNACE code Rev.1.1

ParameterWestern Europe Eastern Europe Europe total

total 2007

TS ′99-′07

TS %

total 2007

TS ′99-′07

TS %

total 2007

TS ′99-′07

TS %

Wood-based

panel industry

(DD 20.2)

Employees (1,000) 75 −8 −10 48 −5 −10 123 −14 −10

EpE 42 2 6 59 4 8 44 48 3

TpE (1,000 �) 254 76 42 69 32 87 182 59 48

Furniture

industry

(DN 36.1)

Employees (1,000) 906 −128 −12 454 59 15 1,360 −68 −5

EpE 8 −1 −9 11 1 11 9 0 −3

TpE (1,000 �) 112 14 14 26 8 48 83 7 10

Total wood-

based panel

and furniture

Employees (1,000) 981 −136 −12 503 54 12 1,483 −82 −5

EpE 9 −1 −9 12 1 9 10 0 −3

TpE (1,000 �) 123 19 18 30 10 51 91 11 14

Data based on EUROSTAT 2011 a.Abbreviations Table 1: TS: Total shift, EpE: Employees per enterprise, TpE: Turnover per employee (inflation rate adjusted to year 1999).

86 T. Osses et al.

Data based on EUROSTAT 2011 a.Abbreviations Figure a): absolute values: RS+: Regional share positive, RS-: Regional share negative, IM: Industrial Mix, NS: National share, TS: Total share. Figure b): relative values change in relation to year 1999: RS %: Regional share, EpE %: Employees per enterprise, TpE %: Turnover per employee (inflation rate adjusted to year 1999). EUROSTAT country codes: BE: Belgium, BG: Bulgaria, CZ: Czech Republic, DK: Denmark, DE: Germany, EE: Estonia, IE: Ireland, EL: Greece, ES: Spain, FR: France, IT: Italy, LV: Latvia, LT: Lithuania, HU: Hungary, NL: Netherlands, AT: Austria, PL: Poland, PT: Portugal, RO: Romania, SI: Slovenia, SK: Slovakia, FI: Finland, SE: Sweden, UK: United Kingdom, NO: Norway.

FIGURE 1 Regional employment shifts of the EU wood-based panel industry, 1999–2007

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 87

West and East (Table 1) do not reveal statistically significant differences, because both negative and positive employment trends occur in both sub-regions (analysis of variance ANOVA). However, significant differences (p <0.05) are observed among the relative shift parameters (Figure 1b): In the West, the TpE increased in all countries, with strongest shifts in Germany, Norway and United Kingdom (average TpE: +68%). The single exception is the Netherlands with a −53% decrease. In the East however, this parameter increased generally above +70%, with especially strong shifts in Slovakia, Lithuania and Czech Republic (TpE: +176% to +286%).

The EpE indicates shifts in the enterprise structure, how-ever with no definite tendency. The West shows rather weak increases, decreases or constant indices. In contrast, the East shows a group of countries indicating pronounced downshifts in enterprise size: Slovakia, Romania, Hungary, Latvia and Estonia reduce their EpE between −21% and −81%. The remaining countries show only weak increases not surpassing +18%. An interesting exception is the Czech Republic reveal-ing a striking increase over +193%, which obviously relates to a new foundation of one or more large scale plants.

Regional trends in furniture industry

In 2007 the European furniture industry counts a total of 151 500 enterprises and 1 360 500 employees (Table 1, appendix Table 4). The largest countries in absolute employ-ment figures are Italy (201 000), Poland (176 500) and Ger-many (167 000). The smallest countries are Ireland (7 300), Norway (8 600) and Estonia (9 900). The industry generated a total turnover of 137.5 bn �, with large shares of Italy (28.5 bn �), Germany (25.8 bn �) and the United Kingdom (15.9 bn �). The countries with lowest turnover (less than 0.5 bn �) are Latvia, Estonia and Bulgaria. The furniture industry shows even more contrasting trends between the Western and Eastern sub-regions (Table 1, Figure 2). Between 1999 and 2007 Europe’s TS counts −68 000 or −5%, which is split in opposite trends in Western (−128 000 or −12%) and Eastern Europe (+60 000 or +15%). While differences in the enterprise structure (EpE) are minor, their productivity (TpE) reveals considerable dissimilarities between the sub-regions - analogous to the wood-based panel industry: Eastern furni-ture industries have in average 1.4 more employees per enter-prise and a four times lower productivity than their Western equivalent. The less productive East shows strong tendencies (TpE: 26; TS: +48%) towards a more productive, yet less dynamic West (TpE: 112; TS: +14%).

The shift-share results demonstrate again the major role of the RS. The NS accounts for only –7% and the IM only for +3%. RS in East and West are significantly different (p<0.05) owing to the opposite sub-regional trends. Eastern countries reveal strong RS accounting in average +20%, in contrast to Western countries with RS accounting for −8%. Also con-trasting trends in EpE are observed, while Western countries decrease in average by −9%, East countries increases in aver-age by +12%. The productivity shift (TpE) is more significant

in the east with +42%, while the west increases by only +14%. All countries in the west, except Ireland, lose employees in furniture industries (Figure 2, appendix Table 4). Consider-able decreases occur in the United Kingdom (−32 500) Ger-many (−29 500) and France (−18 000). Countries with a more dominant RS influence are Sweden, Denmark, Portugal and United Kingdom (TS: −6 000 to −14 000; RS: −17% to −22% of TS). A group of countries with a weaker impact of the RS consists of Belgium, Finland and Norway (in average −13% of TS). Ireland reveals the only positive trend in the West (TS: +1 300 or +12%). The RS reveals a strong influ-ence of +25%. Italy shows a peculiar trend: massive employ-ment losses mark the national economy (NS: −14 800), yet the furniture industry is not affected accordingly: it loses only –1 700 or –1% of its employees due to favorable regional conditions (RS: +4%). Among the Eastern countries, Poland stands out with an increase of +39 600 or +29% (RS: +33%). Although their absolute figures are considerably lower (TS: +4 000 to +14 000), the group of Lithuania, Bulgaria, Latvia and Slovakia, shows even stronger positive influences of the RS between +68% to +132%. However, two Eastern countries, notably Romania and the Czech Republic, lose in furniture industries (RS: −3% to −14%). Romania loses alone around −14 000 employees (TS: −19%).

The observed shift patterns relate to differences in enter-prise structures and productivity trends between Western and Eastern countries. In Austria, Sweden and Norway the average increase in TpE measures even +45%. Alone the Netherlands decrease in productivity by −12%. In contrast, the Eastern countries Lithuania, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria and Estonia gain even more strongly by +65% to +145%. Opposite trends occur in three countries: Greece, Romania and Slovenia decrease between −38% to −3% in productivity. The EpE shows a contrasting trend across the European sub-regions: the West decreases by −9%, while the East increases by +12% (Table 1). Country-level trends show large variations: on the one side considerably decreasing quotients are found in Norway (−63%), Sweden (−36%) and Germany (−26%), on the other side moderately increasing quotients in Italy (+17%) and Denmark (+7%). In the east the EpE is strongly reduced in Hungary, Romania, Estonia Slova-kia, Latvia and Lithuania (between –79% and –27%). In con-trast it increases considerably in Greece (+53%), Slovenia (+51%) and Poland (+ 44%) and more moderately in the Czech Republic and Bulgaria (around +13%). However, it is notable that the group of Eastern countries signalling a strong positive RS (Latvia, Hungary, Slovakia, Lithuania) show a greater reduction in EpE compared to the less dynamic Western countries.

Total employment shifts of the production chain

The total employment shifts in the pair of European wood-based panel and furniture industries (Figure 3) depict an even more contrasting picture of regional shifts between Western and Eastern Europe, which can be grouped into four different pair combinations of regional trends (groups I: -/-, II: +/-, III: -/+, IV: +/+).

88 T. Osses et al.

Data based on EUROSTAT 2011 a. Abbreviations Figure a): absolute values: RS+: Regional share positive, RS-: Regional share negative, IM: Industrial Mix, NS: National share, TS: Total share. Figure b): relative values change in relation to year 1999: RS %: Regional share, EpE %: Employees per enterprise, TpE %: Turnover per employee (inflation rate adjusted to year 1999). EUROSTAT country codes: BE: Belgium, BG: Bulgaria, CZ: Czech Republic, DK: Denmark, DE: Germany, EE: Estonia, IE: Ireland, EL: Greece, ES: Spain, FR: France, IT: Italy, LV: Latvia, LT: Lithuania, HU: Hungary, NL: Netherlands, AT: Austria, PL: Poland, PT: Portugal, RO: Romania, SI: Slovenia, SK: Slovakia, FI: Finland, SE: Sweden, UK: United Kingdom, NO: Norway.

FIGURE 2 Regional employment shifts of the EU furniture industry, 1999–2007

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 89

FIGURE 3 Total shifts of pairs of wood-based panel and furniture industries in the EU, 1999–2007

All countries in the West show an overall negative total shift of employment. The countries with the largest simulta-neous losses in both industries (group I) are the United King-dom (−35 400 or −23%), Germany (−34 000 or −16%), France (−19 300 or 16%) and Portugal (−14 200 or −23%). Weaker losses in group I are identified for Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Italy and the Netherlands. Group II (+/-) collects the

four countries Spain, Belgium, Austria and Norway, which all show an overall negative paired TS. The only exception to these prevailing negative regional trends in Western Europe and also the single case of a country with simultaneous posi-tive growth in both interconnected industries (group IV) is Ireland with a total increase by +1 300 or +19%.

In contrast, Eastern Europe shows mainly positive growth trends of the production chain pair. Poland reveals the top employment growth of all countries with +40 200 (+27%). Group IV includes as well Bulgaria (+14 300 or +75%), and Estonia. The group III comprises Lithuania (+13 500 or +94%), Slovakia (+5 500 or +41%), Hungary, Latvia and Greece. Besides opposite simultaneous negative regional share (group I) are observed in Romania (−22 100 or −18%), the Czech Republic (−4 000 or −8%) and Slovenia. It is note-worthy of this East-West comparison that the group III (-/+) does not occur in the West, while the group II (+/-) does not occur in the East. The reason is that the much larger-scale furniture industry represents the pivotal component in the industry pair.

DISCUSSION

Contrasting structural shifts among European regions

This study investigates the dynamics of employment growth in the production chain of wood-based panel and furniture industries of the European Union between 1999 and 2007. The shift-share analysis proofed to be a valuable tool for exposing regional trends of the value chain of the European wood-based panel and furniture industry that are developing independent from and opposed to overall economic trends. The analysis demonstrates large-scale structural changes in employment of Eastern Europe’s wood-based industries, which reveal themselves much more dynamic compared to their equivalent in Western Europe, and it documents consid-erable shifts of employment from West to the East. The wood-based panel industry shows a rather similar pattern of employment trends between the Western and Eastern sub-regions. In both sub-regions, the majority of countries reveal considerable employment losses, which induce the overall negative employment trend of around −10%. Likewise, a small group of countries in each sub-region opposes this gen-eral trend revealing notable employment growth: in the West, Spain (+1 380), Austria (+1 240) and Belgium (+550), and in the East, Poland (+600), and Bulgaria (+520). Here the posi-tive RS components exceed the relative employment change, indicating the growth to be primarily a function of regional conditions. Overall, this “mixed” pattern controverts the hypothetical distinction between general opposite Western and Eastern trends and suggests that obviously national or sub-national factors play the decisive role in locational decisions in the wood-based panel industry.

The furniture industry however exhibits a clearly two-sided west versus east pattern. Practically all Western coun-tries are marked by large employment losses, with the highest deficits in the United Kingdom (−32 500), Germany (−29 500)

Data based on EUROSTAT 2011 a.Abbreviation for variable Figure 3: TSp: Total shift wood- based panel industry. TSf: Total shift furniture industry, TSt: Total shift Production chain, sum of TSp and TSf. Abbreviation for Group relation TSp/TSf: 1 -/-, 2 +/-, 3 -/+, 4 +/+. EUROSTAT country codes: BE: Belgium, BG: Bulgaria, CZ: Czech Republic, DK: Denmark, DE: Germany, EE: Estonia, IE: Ireland, EL: Greece, ES: Spain, FR: France, IT: Italy, LV: Latvia, LT: Lithuania, HU: Hungary, NL: Netherlands, AT: Austria, PL: Poland, PT: Portugal, RO: Romania, SI: Slovenia, SK: Slovakia, FI: Finland, SE: Sweden, UK: United Kingdom, NO: Norway.

90 T. Osses et al.

and France (−18 000). On the other side strong employment growth occurs in the majority of Eastern countries, with out-standing scores for Poland (+40 100), and positive regional conditions in Lithuania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Latvia, lead-ing to a notable growth. Eight out of eleven Eastern countries show this positive trend. These results confirm the hypothesis of two major opposite employment trends across the Western and Eastern Europe, suggesting the existence of distinct dominant locational factors in these sub-regions. Overall, the production chain wood panels and furniture loses −136 000 employees in the west, and gains a total of +54 000 employ-ees in the east, which means that the calculated shift to the East accounts for 40% of jobs lost in the West.

Cross-border interactions

The study reveals regions where wood-based industries in neighbouring Western and Eastern countries obviously interact. A distinct regional pattern is observable in the wood-based panel industry: Austria shows positive growth in employment and enterprises (+39%) indicating favourable regional conditions. While the size of Austrian enterprises (EpE) does not change, they present the highest increase in turnover as well as in production of wood panel products, +114% and +88% respectively (FAOSTAT 2012). With a TpE productivity level similar to other productive West EU industries (e.g. Germany, United Kingdom, France), Austria however increases in employees, owing to an advantageous geographical location. Austria’s direct neighbours Slovakia, Hungary and the Czech Republic reveal negative RS in employment and strong increases in TpE productivity, as a result of a significant down-sizing transformation towards smaller enterprises (average EpE: 50).

The wood-based panel industry is composed of larger automated production units with comparatively low labor demand; therefore raw material prices and international trade of wood raw materials play a key role in the production (Buehlman et al. 2000, Çolak et al. 2007). Availability and quality of raw materials influences the location of the panel industry in Europe. Austria has an advantageous location as a close neighbor of the Balkan region, one of the richest for-ested areas in Europe with regard to hardwood growing stock (Barbu 2011, Glavonjic et al. 2009, Schwarzbauer and Stern 2010). Raw material prices have increased progressively during the last years, driven by a growing demand for wood energy production (further discussed below). Nevertheless, between 1999 and 2007, Austria increased hardwood imports from the Balkan region from 2% to 14%. Furthermore, Austria’s softwood imports from its neighbors the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Slovenia represent the prin-cipal market share of 33% of roundwood imports in 2007, followed by Germany with 31% (Barbu 2011, Buehlman et al. 2000, FAOSTAT 2012, Glavonjic et al. 2009, Schwarz-bauer and Stern 2010).

Austria’s economy is strongly integrated with Eastern European countries, leading to a favorable climate for cross-border cooperation and investments also in wood industries. Austrian wood industries, which are among the European

leaders in innovation investment, have been outsourcing more skill intensive stages of production to Eastern Europe, which has increased productivity in these countries (Fink and Kraus 2007, Lorentowicz et al. 2005, Niskanen 2006). Austria is furthermore the most important foreign direct investor in Eastern Europe’s wood sector (Brenneke 2009, Glavonjic et al. 2009, Kalotay 2008).

The Austrian wood-based panel industry is strongly export-oriented, figuring 87% of the total production in 2007. Germany and Italy are the principal markets, which have increased their imports of wood-panel products to 86% and 104% respectively in the period under study (FAOSTAT 2012, Rebernig 2007). These cross border market interactions indicate that the cost effective production and proximity to supply and consumer markets are seen as the major competi-tive factors behind the outstanding growth of the Austrian wood-based panel industry in comparison to other EU countries.

The Baltic Sea region reveals East-West interactions in the furniture industry notably between Lithuania, Latvia and Poland (RS: between +68% and +132%) and the Northern countries Sweden, Finland and Denmark (RS: of −14% to −21%). All these countries show comparative advantages in furniture products, notably intensive use of technology, high levels of technical competence, automation and design (Tammela et al. 2008). Eastern countries have largely assumed the role of low-end subcontractors over the last decade (Tiits 2006). Poland increases in number of employ-ees and size of plants (EpE: 44%), while Latvia and Lithuania by increase notably in the number of enterprises (210% and 163% respectively). Both countries decrease in the size of plants significantly, tending more towards the Northern European enterprise structure (EpE: between 6 and 8). Poland’s EpE of 16, on the other hand, resembles more to the structure in neighbouring Germany. Indeed investment in furniture machinery increased strongly during the period 2001–2004 in Lithuania and Latvia (per year +36% and +29% respectively) (Clutier et al. 2007). Furthermore the border region interaction is also linked to the wood raw supply, where Denmark and Finland deal with wood raw material suppliers located in this eastern region, reducing strongly their cost transport (Tammela et al. 2008).

The RS component suggests only a presence or absence of locational advantages (or disadvantages), but cannot identify them (Dinc et al. 1998). Regional factors influencing struc-tural shifts in industry comprise for example the geographical position, labour market conditions, technological innovation, foreign direct investments, impacts of national and regional policy, (wood) raw material supply, entrepreneurial abilities, or other comparative advantages. In the following several potential factors impacting on employment are discussed, which give plausible explanations for our results. However it must be noted that owing to a lack of explicit statistical information for these factors in the industries under study, these arguments cannot be tested for their direct causal relationship.

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 91

Low labour costs versus technological innovation

Furniture production is generally considered a “low-tech” industry with comparatively weak R&D and high labour intensity. Lower production and employment costs represent thus key competitive factors of concern (Hirsch-Kreinsen 2008, Maskell 1998, Poliakov et al. 2009, Scott 2006). According to Whelan and Macklani (2002), labour cost account for up to 40% of total production costs in the wood furniture industry. In fact average per-person-expenditures for salaries and wages in 2007 are four times higher in Western Europe than in the Eastern, contrasting between 22 000 � and 5 100 � (EUROSTAT 2011 a). The large-scale employment shifts towards Eastern countries occur in line with widespread foundation of new furniture enterprises: the number of enter-prises increases significantly by +122% during the period (compared to a weak average growth of +11% in the West) and is linked to high negative trends in the EpE and moderate positive growth of the TpE. This constellation reveals that the growing Eastern furniture industries develop dynamically towards many smaller, more flexible and competitive produc-tion units.

Labour demand in wood-based panels is generally lower compared to furniture. However, contrasting wage levels are of course also a factor in wood-based panel industries: per-person expenditures contrast between 39 500 � (West) and 8 000 � (East) (EUROSTAT 2011 a). The number of enterprises in Eastern Europe increases by +16% in line with significant growth rates in the TpE and diminishing or rather stable EpE. This ‘downsizing’ restructuration improves competitiveness by installing less-labour intense high-end technology, consequently decreasing their number of work-force. The strategy is not only pursued in higher developed countries in Western Europe, but can be also observed in a group of Eastern countries, notably Lithuania, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Estonia and Latvia, which reveal high TpE scores of +86% related to pronounced employment reductions. The pattern differs from the remaining countries in the East and relates to a higher level of technological innovation in this group of countries (Poliakov et al. 2009).

Foreign direct investment (FDI)

Lower labour and production costs in the East offered com-petitive advantages that attracted Western investments into new production capacities and induced relocations of wood industries from West to East. FDI into wood manufacturing are documented for a number of countries (Adamowicz and Wiktorski 2006, Brenneke 2009, Ravn and Petersen 2005, Ukrainski and Varblane 2005). In Poland, FDI in furniture industries amounted for a total of $282 million from 1990–2004, opening access to growing markets and technology and knowledge transfer. In the Czech Republic, the wood-based panel industry improved through FDI principally from Austria and Germany, which is mirrored in the substantial TpE growth (+176%) documented in this study. Estonian wood processing advanced significantly through FDI since the 1990s, nevertheless the share of foreign capital remained

below the average level of the manufacturing industry. In Bulgaria, FDI were largely placed in wood-based-panels and accounted for 90% of total investments in 2005. 60% of these investments related to machinery and equipment. In contrast it is noted that Hungary was not able to attract substantial FDI due to the small size of production of its furniture industry.

A hypothetical argument is that national and European subsidies in Eastern European countries have attracted FDI and thus contributed to the eastward employment shift. In fact the European Union installed regulations in 2007 to prevent negative impacts on employment from offshoring to Eastern Europe, which indicates that such misuse of subsidies has been a problem and may have happened also in wood-based industries. Klein et al. (2009) present evidence from Germany’s post reunification phase, during which several new large wood processing units have been installed in Eastern Germany that received considerable subsidies from federal funds to encourage the investment. However, empiri-cal evidence in the European context is lacking so far.

Outsourcing to foreign suppliers

The main factor inducing the pronounced employment shifts is the increasing importance of large-scale manufacturing of ready-to-assemble furniture, a major emerging trend of the last decades. Furniture assembly is easier to be transported over long distances and makes it possible to develop more distant locations with lower production costs. Outsourcing and subcontracting of parts of production to suppliers in lower cost Eastern countries was a solution for Western pro-ducers to strengthen their competitive position on globalized markets, yet it caused significant losses in employment in the Western EU (Drayse 2011, ITC and ITTO 2005, Kaplinsky et al. 2008, Scott 2006).

Principal destinations for outsourcing of wood elements, wood-based panels and other semi-finished furniture compo-nents have been Poland, the Baltic States Lithuania and Esto-nia, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Slovakia, and Romania. These countries represent the most dynamic countries, as is demonstrated in the findings of this study. As a result, Eastern countries significantly increased their market share in furniture-related exports over the last decade, with especially high average annual growth rates of around 15%. In the West, exports decreased considerably, in particular in Germany, United Kingdom, Finland, Sweden, Ireland and Netherlands (Clutier et al. 2007, Poliakov et al. 2009).

During the last decade, the furniture industry of many Western countries encountered numerous difficulties con-nected to increasing labour and energy costs, price pressure, limited upgrading possibilities and low investment expendi-tures. The case of Germany and Poland, which were identified in this study among the main “losers” and “winners” of employment in both industries, is a good example of this ma-jor trend: Since 2000, Germany’s wood panel and furniture sector is characterized by reduced investments and innova-tions, because of external factors such as a decrease in domes-tic furniture consumption and increasing pressure through imports from abroad, especially Asia. In response, German

92 T. Osses et al.

furniture producers strongly outsourced components to Poland, which allowed them to stabilise their production and gain in competitiveness. However, as a consequence of this process, further pushed through company fusions and relocation, the German furniture industry lost over 25% of its employees during less than a decade, which is not counterbal-anced by the number of new jobs in Eastern Europe (Adamowicz and Wiktorski 2006, Brenneke 2009, ITC and ITTO 2005).

Wood raw material supply

Besides skilled workforce, a major factor in outsourcing and relocation of furniture industries is the regional supply of wood raw materials. Although this classical “comparative advantage” gradually has become less important in a global-ized economy with its widespread increases in import-exports, it remains a decisive factor in wood industries, mainly linked to the weight and high transportation costs of the raw material. Stable procurement, market competition and even potential raw material exhaustion are key issues for the resource-based wood industries, which become even more topical in times of rapid growth of alternative energetical or chemical uses of wood.

Primary users of wood such as sawmilling or wood-based panel industries are spread across whole Europe, but geo-graphically they are often situated in the more remote regions of a country, in proximity to forest areas, the source of raw timber. This spatial resource dependency factor has been investigated so far for these primary wood users (e.g. Aguilar 2009, Kies et al. 2009,), but not yet explicitly for secondary wood manufacturers such as furniture industries. The scien-tific evidence is sparse and comprises only few indications, e.g. it is suggested that the regional availability of specific hard wood species played a role in the relocation of particular furniture industries (Clutier et al. 2007, ITC and ITTO 2005).

The rising competition for wood raw materials with emerging bioenergy markets is a regional factor that is expected to have a strong influence on the wood industry’s future. Wood/solid biomass is the key resource for renewable energy consumption accounting today for 70% of generated renewable energy (EurObserv’ER 2010). Broad European policy initiatives and different national subsidy programs, which are initiated to promote and strengthen biomass-based energy plants, have a considerable impact on wood markets and intensified competition between wood-based industries. In fact the rise of industrial roundwood prices caused by the competition of these branches (energy vs. wood-based indus-tries), benefits the forestry and the sawmilling industry, but affects the wood-based panel industry as well as the pulp and paper production, as wood and wood wastes are currently the major source for renewable energy.

The wood-based panel industries losing gross profit due to reduced production levels and increasing costs could also negatively affect downstream production in the construction and furniture industries. The future impacts on these indus-tries per country are not easy to predict, yet they will diverge

based on regional wood availability, structure of the forest-based sector, technological development, political incentives and the development of energy prices as well as the supply of wood residues and the emerging energy markets in the coming decades (Barbu 2011, Schwarzbauer und Stern 2010).

Dynamics in world trade

Global trade in furniture evolved significantly during the past decade linked to innovations in packaging and shipment logistics as well as decreasing world trade barriers (Han et al. 2009). This worldwide change gradually reduced the large export and market share by high-income countries in wooden furniture trade (e.g. Italy, Germany, U.S.), which lose their comparative advantage to Eastern Europe, but also to Asia and Latin America, owing to lower labor and production costs and locational advantages. Table 2 shows the international trade of wood-based panel and furniture products in Europe during the study period 1999 to 2007. Europe’s total imports of wood-based panel products account for 9.3 billion � in 2007, out of which two thirds come in fact from EU-internal imports. These have increased by +49%, while external imports from the rest of the world grew only by +30%. The imports of furniture show stronger growth of external, Non-EU-markets (+123%) compared to internal markets (+36%). In Europe’s total imports, Eastern Europe’s represents only a minor share: 84% of wood-based panels and 90% of furniture imports are imports into Western Europe. Notable in these growth figures is the particular role of furniture imports from China, which have grown in Europe fivefold between 1999 to 2007 and account for 15% of total in 2007 (UN Comtrade database 2012).

Furthermore, the increase of international trade also promotes expansion of foreign supply networks. Our results clearly detect the European furniture industry’s shifts from West to East Europe, principally towards Poland and Lithua-nia, which both are growing into export-oriented furniture producers. Comparable shifts have taken place for example in Mexico, exporting 90% of its furniture to the U.S. (Adamo-wicz 2006, Han et al. 2009). The employment downturn in the U.S. furniture industry is also linked to increasing imports of semi-finished and finished furniture from low-cost countries such as China, Vietnam or other Southeast Asian countries and has led to demands of anti-dumping in the U.S. and the EU (Bumgardner et al. 2011).

In conclusion, this research provides evidence for large scale employment shifts in the EU production chain of wood-based panel and furniture industries, revealing opposite growth trends between West and East. Western countries lose employees on a large scale for the sake of new emerging jobs in Eastern countries, however on a smaller scale. These shifts go along with considerable restructuring within the industries, notably downsizing in wood-based panels and enlargement in Eastern furniture industries, which reveal much higher dynamic. Outsourcing and relocation to cheaper production environments in Eastern Europe represent successful strate-gies to face global competition in the market and influence the

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 93

transformation process in the new member states and neigh-bouring countries. It can be deduced that the regional avail-ability of skilled, low cost labour and raw wood material represent key locational factors in furniture production. Because manufacturing of furniture can be build on rather low-level technologies, it is therefore likely that the depicted outsourcing model will still be replicated further in even more regions and that the eastward employment shift in furniture will not soon be discontinued.

The study highlights regions where wood-based panel and furniture industries in neighbouring Western and Eastern countries clearly interact. The findings of cross-regional employment shifts can help to inform regional policies for sustainable development of Europe’s forest-based sector from a macroeconomic and social perspective, aiming to gradually achieve a balanced development of productivity and working conditions in Western and Eastern Europe.

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TABLE 2 Total imports of wood-based panel and furniture products in Western and Easter Europe, 1999–2007

ProductsSITC code REV. 3

Valueimports billion €

Western Europe Eastern Europe Total Europe

total 2007

TS ′99-′07

TS %

total 2007

TS ′99-′07

TS %

total 2007

TS ′99-′07

TS %

Wood-based

panel products

(634)

EU-Internal 5.7 1.6 39 1.3 0.7 124 7.0 2.3 49

External (Non-EU) 2.1 0.4 21 0.3 0.2 157 2.4 0.5 30

Total World 7.8 2.0 34 1.5 0.9 129 9.3 2.8 44

Furniture

products

(821)

EU-Internal 22.9 5.3 30 2.9 1.4 101 25.8 6.8 36

External (Non-EU) 10.8 5.7 113 0.8 0.7 440 11.6 6.4 123

Total World 33.7 11.0 48.9 3.7 2.1 133.5 37.4 13.2 54

Data based on Eurostat 2012 bNotes: imports: inflation rate adjusted to year 1999. Norway not included.EU-Internal imports statistics cover the trading of goods between EU 27 Member States. External (Non-EU) imports statistics cover the trading of goods between a Member State and a non-member country (World without EU27).

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APPENDIXES

TABLE 3 Regional shift share analysis and structural change in European wood-based panel industry, 1999 and 2007

a-Wood-based panel (DD 20.2)

EuropeReg.

Country2007

EShift share analisis 99′-′07 2007

EpEShifttotal

99′-′07%

2007TpE

Shifttotal

99′-′07%TS TS% NS IM RS RS%

W DE 16,717 −4,486 −21.2 −1,554 −553 −2380 −11.2 76 15.2 25.2 339 145 74.7

W UK 4,519 −2,897 −39.1 −543 −193 −2160 −29.1 30 0.2 0.6 294 109 59.1

E SK 2,071 −1,529 −42.5 −264 −94 −1171 −32.5 53 −223.8 −80.8 76 57 285.9

W FI 5,700 −1,374 −19.4 −518 −184 −671 −9.5 158 19.6 14.2 175 50 40.1

E RO 8,338 −1,319 −13.7 −708 −252 −360 −3.7 36 −31.4 −46.9 8 2 32.2

W FR 7,692 −1,270 −14.2 −657 −234 −380 −4.2 48 −7.6 −13.6 245 56 29.3

E LV 4,516 −987 −17.9 −403 −143 −440 −8.0 188 −87.0 −31.6 47 22 86.2

E HU 1,667 −885 −34.7 −187 −67 −631 −24.7 40 −27.5 −40.9 79 21 35.4

E CZ 4,386 −865 −16.5 −385 −137 −343 −6.5 51 33.6 193.3 107 68 175.9

W PT 2,293 −541 −19.1 −208 −74 −259 −9.1 48 −33.2 −41.0 177 51 40.8

E LT 2,998 −418 −12.2 −250 −89 −79 −2.3 75 11.5 18.1 52 36 220.3

W IT 11,579 −359 −3.0 −875 −311 827 6.9 30 4.6 18.0 223 49 27.9

E SI 1,801 −301 −14.3 −154 −55 −92 −4.4 72 18.1 33.7 57 8 16.4

W DK 1,129 −246 −17.9 −101 −36 −109 −8.0 28 4.5 19.1 156 46 41.2

W NL 266 −227 −46.0 −36 −13 −178 −36.1 11 −9.1 −46.0 83 −94 −53.2

W SE 1,644 −217 −11.7 −136 −48 −32 −1.7 17 −7.7 −31.0 191 42 28.2

E EL 2,176 −63 −2.8 −164 −58 159 7.1 44 6.2 16.3 114 2 1.8

W IE 769 29 3.9 −54 −19 103 13.9 59 −23.1 −28.1 290 40 16.0

E EE 1,974 38 2.0 −142 −50 231 11.9 116 −30.3 −20.7 42 22 107.9

W NO 1,183 74 6.7 −81 −29 184 16.6 49 8.2 20.0 255 106 71.3

E BG 3,917 523 15.4 −249 −88 860 25.3 96 1.3 1.3 28 12 71.9

W BE 3,365 548 19.5 −206 −73 828 29.4 49 11.7 31.6 371 58 18.3

E PL 14,375 597 4.3 −1,010 −359 1,966 14.3 65 12.2 23.1 111 49 79.8

W AT 4,774 1,239 35.0 −259 −92 1,590 45.0 191 −5.4 −2.8 282 75 35.9

W ES 13,077 1,377 11.8 −857 −305 2,539 21.7 28 3.4 14.1 192 34 21.3

Data based on EUROSAT 2011 a. EUROSTAT country codes: BE: Belgium, BG: Bulgaria, CZ: Czech Republic, DK: Denmark, DE: Germany, EE: Estonia, IE: Ireland, EL: Greece, ES: Spain, FR: France, IT: Italy, LV: Latvia, LT: Lithuania, HU: Hungary, NL: Netherlands, AT: Austria, PL: Poland, PT: Portugal, RO: Romania, SI: Slovenia, SK: Slovakia, FI: Finland, SE: Sweden, UK: United Kingdom, NO: Norway.

Employment growth in the European wood-based panel and furniture industries 97

TABLE 4 Regional shift share analysis and structural change in European furniture industry, 1999 and 2007

b-Furniture DN 36.1

EuropeReg.

Country2007

EShift share analisis 99′-′07 2007

EpEShifttotal

99′-′07%

2007TpE

Shifttotal

99′-′07%TS TS% NS IM RS RS %

W UK 116,324 −32,479 −21.8 −10,905 3,789 −25,363 −17.0 16 −2.0 −11.1 121 23 24.0

W DE 167,145 −29,425 −15.0 −14,406 5,005 −20,025 −10.2 16 −5.4 −25.6 135 1 0.6

E RO 90,678 −20,796 −18.7 −8,169 2,838 −15,465 −13.9 21 −36.7 −63.5 4 −1 −25.5

W FR 94,284 −18,030 −16.1 −8,231 2,860 −12,659 −11.3 5 −1.1 −18.5 121 16 15.1

W PT 46,578 −13,692 −22.7 −4,417 1,535 −10,810 −17.9 6 −1.4 −18.1 35 5 16.3

W SE 20,558 −7,265 −26.1 −2,039 708 −5,934 −21.3 6 −3.5 −35.9 150 46 44.8

W ES 131,453 −6,464 −4.7 −10,107 3,512 131 0.1 7 0.0 −0.2 73 12 19.8

W DK 18,495 −6,318 −25.5 −1,818 632 −5,131 −20.7 20 1.3 6.7 143 32 29.1

W BE 17,500 −4,141 −19.1 −1,586 551 −3,106 −14.4 7 −0.4 −5.7 144 23 18.6

W AT 35,969 −3,652 −9.2 −2,904 1,009 −1,757 −4.4 10 −1.3 −11.5 102 32 45.9

E CZ 40,443 −3,162 −7.3 −3,196 1,110 −1,077 −2.5 9 1.0 12.2 53 29 122.9

W FI 10,395 −2,475 −19.2 −943 328 −1,860 −14.4 7 −1.2 −15.0 123 20 19.6

W NO 8,627 −1,964 −18.5 −776 270 −1,458 −13.8 8 −13.6 −62.7 165 48 40.7

W IT 201,563 −1,730 −0.9 −14,898 5,176 7,992 3.9 7 1.0 17.0 117 16 15.8

W NL 30,015 −1,418 −4.5 −2,304 800 85 0.3 6 −1.7 −23.2 105 −14 −11.8

E SI 12,193 −377 −3.0 −921 320 224 1.8 11 3.8 50.7 36 −1 −2.9

E EE 9,880 183 1.9 −711 247 646 6.7 18 −19.7 −52.5 30 12 65.1

E EL 20,881 891 4.5 −1,465 509 1,847 9.2 3 1.0 53.3 28 −17 −38.2

W IE 7,272 1,264 21.0 −440 153 1,551 25.8 14 −4.4 −24.0 91 15 20.4

E LV 10,172 3,929 62.9 −458 159 4,228 67.7 15 −9.4 −38.1 17 5 42.6

E HU 22,299 4,501 25.3 −1,304 453 5,352 30.1 6 −23.9 −79.1 22 4 21.6

E SK 16,775 7,031 72.2 −714 248 7,497 76.9 51 −57.1 −52.8 39 19 92.9

E BG 29,466 13,727 87.2 −1,153 401 14,480 92.0 15 1.9 14.2 9 4 78.7

E LT 24,954 13,978 127.4 −804 279 14,503 132.1 19 −6.8 −26.6 27 16 143.8

E PL 176,556 39,556 28.9 −10,040 3,488 46,108 33.7 13 3.9 44.3 33 11 48.0

Data based on EUROSTAT 2011 a. EUROSTAT country codes: BE: Belgium, BG: Bulgaria, CZ: Czech Republic, DK: Denmark, DE: Germany, EE: Estonia, IE: Ireland, EL: Greece, ES: Spain, FR: France, IT: Italy, LV: Latvia, LT: Lithuania, HU: Hungary, NL: Netherlands, AT: Austria, PL: Poland, PT: Portugal, RO: Romania, SI: Slovenia, SK: Slovakia, FI: Finland, SE: Sweden, UK: United Kingdom, NO: Norway.