According research by Colliers International, the CEE-6’s contribution to the EU manufacturing output has more than doubled in the past 16 years, when the countries of Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Slovakia first joined the European Union.

Among the many comparisons being drawn, Colliers reports that the CEE-6 has overtaking both Spain and the UK and is close to surpassing France. Also, in terns of the level of labour costs for manufacturing, Romania is not comparable to China while Poland and Hungary have both surpassed the Asian manufacturing giant.

Colliers attributes this massive output growth to the region’s highly-skilled workforce and relatively low cost of labour, as well as these countries’ track record for competitive industrial production. From a near-shoring perspective, there is certainly a lot of be gleened from this information. According to the head of research at Colliers in Romania, labour costs in Germany currently stand at three times those in the Czech Republic, four times those in Hungary and Poland, six times those in Romania, and eight times those in Bulgaria. 

The study also notes that while factories in the area were initially focused on churning out low-cost and low-complexity goods, this has changed over time to include more high-tech and high-value goods, implying that the region may have a bright future ahead of it.