Portugal was the second European country where more companies were created in 2017

  • ECO News
  • 17 February 2020

In 2017, the share of new companies in the total number of companies was 15.8%.

Portugal is on the European podium at the level of business creation. With a rate of 15.8% of new companies out of the total number of active companies, national entrepreneurs placed the country in second place in the European business birth rate in 2017. Better only Lithuania with a rate of 19.7%. This is well above the European average of 9.3%, according to data revealed this Monday by Eurostat.

The European rate of 9.3% was exactly the same as the previous year, but represents a slight increase over the 9% of 2012. In Portugal, the figures for 2017 represent an increase of 0.2 percentage points compared to 2016. But in 2015, the rate had been higher than the values registered in 2017 (15.91%).

However, the most significant year-on-year evolution was that of Finland (2.9 percentage points). In the opposite direction, Malta fell by 6.1 percentage points to 10.2%.

According to Eurostat, the employment generated by these newly created companies was 2.4% of total employment in the European Union in 2017. In Portugal, however, the indicator is much more significant and puts the country in first place with 5.2%. At the end of the table are Germany and the Netherlands with 1.2%.