Romania, 6th in the world in terms of business services industry (report)
Romania ranks 6th in the world in terms of business services industry and 2nd in Europe, after Poland, according to a report of a professional association, told Agerpres.
Currently, the number of employees in the business services industry is greater than 2% of the economically active population of the country.
"Romania still has many advantages to offer to investors in the business services industry. Among them is a timely cost of business development and labour, even in the IT area, with a 20% lower difference compared with Poland. The highest number of foreign languages in all Central and Eastern European countries is spoken in Romania, which is seen as one of the most important advantages for the diversification of services in business services (according to the latest ABSL Romania study, 23% of companies perform activities in 11-15 foreign languages, and 15% of companies have between 16-20 foreign languages). Also, expertise in technology is an advantage," according to Nicoleta Apetrei, ABSL deputy chair.
The business services sector has continued to grow globally at an average of 6% over the past two years. After Asia, where approximately 45% of the total number of companies is found, Central and Eastern Europe ranks second in the world in terms of regions where this industry is developed, with approximately 31% of companies.
"The centres of excellence developed in the last two years come with solid expertise in areas such as IT, finance and accounting, procurement, still making Romania a preferred destination for services that generate high added value. But Romania is in direct competition with countries from the CEE region - especially Poland and Hungary - in terms of available grants, tax incentives and support to the business services industry. While Romania provides support through tax incentives and employment policies, Poland and Hungary provide a set of measures that may seem more comprehensive, which includes supporting the purchase of equipment and a higher total value of the grant - EUR 100 million in Poland vs EUR 45 million in Romania," according to the report.
According to ABSL, the difference is that Poland "has seven industries of interest on the list, with business services occupying a leading place in the ranking. In Romania, tax incentives are granted for production, research and development, and IT."
"Romania's competitiveness on the business services market is influenced by many factors including the performance of the educational system, a large number of foreign language speakers, IT knowledge, tax policies, the cost of daily living, the cost of labour, etc. All these converge into one point: the human resource, which if we lose, this sector will not be able to develop," according to ABSL Deputy Chairman Catalin Iorgulescu.
ABSL says that 70% of the companies estimate that they will witness an increase in turnover in 2023 and 94% of companies estimate that Romania offers numerous investment opportunities in the sector.
The most recent data show that the revenues generated by the industry for business services were EUR 9 billion. Also, the contribution of this sector to GDP in Romania is higher than the European average in recent years.
The Association of Business Service Leaders in Romania (ABSL) is a leading organisation that represents the business services sector, bringing together over 80 such companies operating in Shared Services Centres (SSC), Business Process Outsourcing (BPO), Information Technology Outsourcing (ITO), Research and Development (R&D).
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