Across the European Union, there was a total of over 32 million enterprises in the EU, 3.4 million new enterprises were born that year, and according to the preliminary data, 2.8 enterprise deaths were registered. The enterprise birth rate was 10.5% while the preliminary rate of enterprise deaths stood at 8.7%.
Latvia did better than average on both counts with an enterprise birth rate of 14.3%, around double its enterprise death rate of 7.85%.
This information comes from data on business demography published by Eurostat.
In most EU countries, in 2022, more companies were created than dissolved. The exceptions were Bulgaria, Estonia, Ireland, Denmark, Poland and Germany, where the death rates of enterprises were higher than the birth rates.
The highest enterprise birth rates were recorded in Lithuania (18.3%), Portugal (16.7%) and Estonia (16.6%). In contrast, the lowest rates were registered in Austria (6.2%), Denmark (7.4%) and Italy (7.9%).
The highest death rates of enterprises were registered in Estonia (25.1%), Bulgaria (20.6%) and Ireland (15.6%), according to the preliminary data. The lowest rates were registered in Greece (3.1%), Belgium (5.2%) and Cyprus (5.8%).
Latvia also did fairly well in a measure of high growth enterprises (growth in employment by more than 10%) which play an important role in the contribution to economic growth and the creation of jobs.
In 2022, around 156 000 companies, or almost a tenth (9.2%) of all active enterprises with at least 10 employees in the EU business economy were recognised as high-growth enterprises, providing work for 13.2 million employees.
In 2022, considerable variations were observed across the EU Member States in the distribution of high-growth enterprises. The shares ranged from 20.3% in Sweden to less than 1.8% in Cyprus. Latvia was in between with a figure of just over 10%, slightly ahead of both Lithuania and Estonia.
