Poland and Europe want to become independent of China: to produce cheap and pay to employees. Here are the conditions of saving and development of industry

Luc Williams

Everyone happily too young, to remember the harsh times of the Polish People’s Republic, they consider it normal that at the discounts in popular store chains you can buy beautiful and well-sewn children’s ski chanterelles for the equivalent of a three-line pear mesh, a kilo of chicken or 15 free-range eggs. Winter boots are quite natural for them at the price of a one -course dinner in a cheap restaurant. The quality of this clothing is also not amazing – completely good, meeting EU standards. And that At 95 percent, the inscription “Made in China” appears on the tags (these 5 percent are Vietnam, or Bangladesh or another Far East country; products from Turkey and Tunisia are usually more expensive). I am so ridiculously low. It’s a matter of experience:

  • To this day, my mother recalls how she bought a youth coat for all her first salary (it was 40 percent cheaper than that “for adults”);
  • I remember perfectly well when the jeans cost half my dad’s salary
  • When I started working, the most simply winter jacket cost a half average salary, i.e. in today’s realities about PLN 3,000.

Today, in the statistical expenses of the Polish family – according to the Central Statistical Office – clothing and footwear constitute … 2.3 percent. We spend eight times more on food and drinks, six times more on maintaining apartments, almost twice as much on recreation and culture and only a little less for alcohol. How is this possible? The answer is very simple: thanks to the transfer of clothing and footwear from Europe to Asia years ago, especially China, clothes and shoes became – relatively – some … a hundred times cheaper.

Industry in China: from mass trash to quality and innovation

The Chinese competitiveness was first based on a huge number of funny workforce: when the first Western companies placed their production in the Middle Kingdom, they paid the average employee the equivalent of today’s PLN 200. However, from the 1990s to the end of the first decade of the 21st century, real wages in Chinese factories have increased over 10 times and have become unacceptable for some Western investors. A group of those looking for low costs of tycoons began to transfer production to other Asia countries, including Burma, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand. Others focused on Tunisia, Morocco and Turkey, but also European countries with the lowest wages: Portugal, Greece, and above all Romania and Bulgaria. However, this was never involved in the transfer of 1: 1 production – new factories were very mechanized, there were fewer and fewer workers (workers), and more and more automatic and robotics.

The Chinese quickly reacted to this trend. From the beginning of Western expansion, they studied intensively, copied what they could, and then began to develop creatively. Around the turn of the first and second decade of this century, “Chinese trash” began to be a thing of the past. Factories in the Middle Kingdom have been thoroughly modernizedfor over a decade, China has been the leader of global robotization, in recent years they have been installing more than half of all robots in the world in their factories. Their factories are still far from the global leader, i.e. South Korea, which is already well over 1,000 robots per 10,000. employed in industry, but with an indicator of 470 they became strong vice -leaderahead of Germany (429), Japan (419) and Sweden (347). Poland – as I wrote broadly – it has a rate of 78 robots per 10,000 Employed in industry and in recent years she recorded a regression of robotization: in a year we installed less than 2.7 thousand. robots. Germany installs the same in its factories – in a month. And the Chinese – in three days. It is difficult to talk about earned Chinese seamstresses. Rather, they are operators of the most modern and most efficient machines in the world.

Industry in China and industry in Poland: Applications to draw

The Chinese have already ceased to be cheap employees: now their factories earn the equivalent of about 6,000. PLN per month, but the salaries of the elite of engineers are already higher than in Poland. Chinese factories effectively combine a number of old and new advantages:

  • The effect of the scale – it is not only about global sales, but also that the rich Chinese society creates a giant “local” market; The higher the production, the lower the unit costs – and therefore the final price of the product;
  • Productivity – 10 thousand The most efficient Polish employees armed with 78 robots have no chance of 10,000. (even average) Chinese employees supported by 500 robots; in new factories, the robotization factor exceeds … 2,000;
  • System state support – exporters use such solutions as negative income tax on companies (which means de facto government surcharges for exports, which are the subject of a dispute with the European Commission – recently has been about electric cars);
  • Increasingly high quality – we all know that the Chinese can produce both Mercedes and smartphones with fabulous possibilities, and Louis Vuitton’s purse;
  • Technological innovations – the Chinese, like the Japanese and then Koreans, moved some time ago from the copy stage to the creation stage, as exemplified by the well -known smartphones and electronic devices on the Vistula (including laptops and computers), RTV and household appliances, and in recent years Cars.

This is a murderous competitive economic machine, supported by the famous Chinese Marketplaces. Aliexpress has 150 million customers, of which 9 million from Poland. It grows even faster – aggressively advertising – who was visited by almost 15 million Polish women and Poles last year. Everyone who talks about mass transfer of industrial production from Asia to Europe should first look not only at prices, but also the quality of products offered on these websites. And answer two fundamental questions:

• Are we able to on the common European market – still nominally richer than the Chinese, but number three times smaller, and in addition often shot due to the protectionist practices of individual member countries – offer products at a similar price?

• Is the European consumer able to swallow the slightly higher prices of products produced in Europe convinced by the argument that native factories solidly reward their employees and pay taxes on the Old Continent?

For now, the answer is not overly affirmative. While doing Christmas errands, we paid shops filled to the brim with products from China. We broke the transaction record for this. And check out who produced your phone (ok, if it is Samsung, it is probably Vietnine, and if the latest iPhone – India, although it was China before), your laptop, kitchen equipment, watch, towel, bedding, toys for kids. And, of course, clothes and shoes.

Business in Poland: production or import from Asia?

Last year I wrote in a report from the European Forum of footwear and leather industry in Krakow that Poland has become one of the largest in Europe and … world of footwear exporters in recent years. It’s just that not their own – because Polish factories fall like flies. In a few years, production fell by half in Poland, over 500 manufacturing companies were liquidated. No, not because Poles and Poles suddenly started walking barefoot. Simply our entrepreneurs took a large -scale import of products from China – they brought in the decade Billion parish

The shoes are also massively bought at the mentioned Chinese websites. Effect? A decade ago we imported 140 million pairs of shoes a year, and exported 90 million couples. Last year, the number of imported footwear doubled, and exports increased to 130 million par. The vast majority of imports come from China, the rest from Vietnam and Indonesia.

Not only Polish producers have a problem with the expansion of Chinese footwear (although the behavior of Polish consumers are clearly the most pro -Chinese in Europe). There is anxiety throughout the industry on the Old Continent, and also results from new restrictive EU regulations and dramatic leaks of EU borders. The European leather industry consists of 99 percent of small and medium -sized companies, and these are very sensitive to any changes and exacerbations of the regulations. Meanwhile, the EU, seeking to limit the impact of industry on the environment and a more sustainable economy, operating to a high degree in a closed circulation, imposes further requirements and obligations on entrepreneurs.

In the appeal to the European Commission, the EU Association of Industry wrote that “there is an urgent need to strengthen customs controls in terms of the quality of imported products, the level of chemical pollution, paid duties and taxes.” Emphasize that Every entrepreneur in Europe must meet the increasingly strict requirements, which costs, and in the meantime a whole bunch of imported goods do not even meet elementary normsand; It is also about following factories in which these products are created, EU security standards and social and environmental principles, otherwise extremely dishonest competition will finish EU business in turn. There is also the subject of anti -dumping procedures in the appeal – no goods in the EU can be subsidized, and in the meantime Chinese imports notoriously arouse suspicions related to state support.

European producers demand that the EU authorities guarantee that The same rules resulting from green transformation will apply to all products on the European marketregardless of whether it was produced in the EU or imported from outside it. Finally, in the industry’s opinion, a “EU information campaign” is necessary to “increase the demand for products produced in Europe from sustainable materials such as natural leather” and combating the phenomenon of greenwashing manifested, among others in using the terms “ecological leather” or “environmentally friendly product”.

Entrepreneurs have high hopes for the EU introduced Digital product passport – In their opinion, he should play a key role in informing consumers about the material used and its proven real impact on health and security.

Industry in Europe on defensive. Time for a counterattack

After the pandemic, there was a lot of talk in the west of reshoring and nearshoringi.e. transferring industrial plants from Asia (and other places) to Europe and the USA to avoid breaking supply chains in the future and generally become economically independent of uncertain or not necessarily friendly areas. In the realities of the tightening competition between China and the West, the Renaissance of the European industry seemed to be an obvious undertaking. However, it cannot be hidden that the key European industries are today on the defensive rather than in the score. And their situation may still get worse due to the actions of the new American administration Donald Trump.

In Poland, according to the Central Statistical Office, entrepreneurs have fought fiercely for recent years of maintenance. In 2024, the gross rotation profitability indicator decreased from 5.7 percent. up to 4.3 percent, and net turnover ratio – from 4.7 percent up to 3.5 percent According to the latest research of the Polish Economic Institute, improving profitability in 2025 is expected only by 19 percent. enterprises, and 28 percent He believes that the profitability of their enterprise in 2025 will be worse than in 2024. Most often, large (28 %) companies count on improvement in profitability, less often average and small (about 20 %), and the least often microfirms (only 14 percent. ). Everyone is most afraid of not so much a decrease in revenues as for further rapid increase in costs, including place. In Poland, this growth is to be the highest in Europe.

An effective counterattack of Poland and Europe will only be possible if we use similar solutions in our factories as in South Korea and China. Only – more. The very protection of the market against the storm with the help of duties and other barriers is definitely not enough, especially since one of the superpower of Europe was export for decades. Salvating key European, including Polish sectors of the economy, depends on how quickly we will digit, automate, robotize and how dynamic our innovation centers will be. We also need to force the quality and compliance with our standards from all who want to be present on the European market. Otherwise, there is no question of fair competition.

About LUC WILLIAMS

Luc's expertise lies in assisting students from a myriad of disciplines to refine and enhance their thesis work with clarity and impact. His methodical approach and the knack for simplifying complex information make him an invaluable ally for any thesis writer.