Archive:High-tech statistics
- Data from October 2011, most recent data: Further Eurostat information, Main tables and Database.
This article analyses data on high-technology or 'high-tech' sectors in the European Union (EU) and in some EFTA and candidate countries. Creating, exploiting and commercialising new technologies has become essential in the global race for competitiveness and high-tech sectors and enterprises are key drivers of economic growth, productivity and social protection, and generally a source of high-value-added and well-paid employment.
High-tech can be defined according to three different approaches:
- the sector approach looks at the high-tech manufacturing sector, medium high-tech manufacturing sector, and high-tech knowledge-intensive service sector, focusing on employment, and economic indicators as shown in Table 1.
- the product approach simply considers whether a product is high-tech or not and examines trade in high-tech products;
- the patent approach distinguishes high-tech patents from others and also defines what biotechnology patents are.
Main statistical findings
Economic statistics on high-tech sectors
In 2008, the European Union had almost 50 000 enterprises in high-tech manufacturing and 756 000 in high-tech knowledge-intensive services (Table 1). High-tech manufacturers were most numerous in Germany, United Kingdom, Italy and France, all together accounting for around 55 % of the high-tech sector in the EU. The United Kingdom displayed the greatest number of enterprises in the high-tech knowledge-intense services (KIS) sector (144 006), comprising almost one-fifth of the EU total, followed by Italy and Germany.
An interesting picture emerges when considering turnover; Germany led the way in 2008, with a total turnover and value added almost twice as high as in the countries with comparable numbers of high tech manufacturers. Germany's turnover represented almost one-fourth of EU total in 2008 rounded to EUR 128 billion in high-tech manufacturing, ahead of France (EUR 76 billion) and Italy (EUR 50 billion). The value added was distributed in 2008 in a similar way with the higest contribution of Germany close to EUR 41 billion, followed by France and United Kingdom (EUR 20 billion each).
Turning to the high-tech KIS sector, in 2008, the European Union had 756 thousand enterprises in high-tech knowledge-intensive services, 33 % of which were registered in the United Kingdom and Italy with 144 000 and 104 000 respectively. However, what it is striking is that the turnover, production value and value added figures were practically twice as high in the United Kingdom as in Italy. One of the main reasons for this is the size class of enterprises and a prevailing share of small and medium-sized enterprises (SME).
Trade in high-tech products
Trade in high-tech products refers to the import and export of products identified as being of high-technology. A list of such products was compiled based on the R & D intensity (R & D expenditure/total sales). Products with high R & D intensity are classified as high-tech and are regrouped in 9 groups.On the global level, the export value of high-tech products represented around 16 % of all exports value in 2009. The two groups of products together, i.e. ‘Electronics – telecommunication’ and ‘Computer – office machines’ accounted for 63 % of high-tech exports worldwide (Figure 1). ‘Scientific instruments’, ‘Aerospace’ and 'Pharmacy' jointly mounted up to for one fourth of global high-tech exports. By contrast, ‘Chemistry, ‘Non-electrical machinery’, ‘Electrical machinery’ and ‘Armament’ summed up to a mere 10% of total high-tech exports.
In 2009, the three world leaders in terms of exports of high-tech products were China (21.6 %), the EU (15.9 %) and the United States (13.5 %). Hong-Kong ranked at the fourth position with a share of 8.1 %. Japan, which remained until 2007 the fourth biggest exporter of high-tech goods, fell to the sixth position with a share of 6.2 %. Two other countries: Singapore and South Korea recorded also significant shares of 6.2 % and placed themselves at the level of Japan. The high performance of Hong-Kong and Singapore, both being relatively small Asian countries was driven by the important number of transiting high-tech products. Those two countries owe their ranks to the hub effect and re-exports of goods. ‘Other Asian countries’, Malaysia, Switzerland and Mexico registered their shares in exports of high-tech products ranging from 5.3 % to 2.4 %. Close behind came Thailand, Canada and Philippines with shares between 1.8 % and 1.1 %. The remaining main EU partners, Israel, India, Norway, Russian Federation, Indonesia, Brazil and Australia each recorded global export shares in high-tech products below 1%.
In 2009, the 21 largest exporting countries (entities) accounted for 98.6 % of global exports in high-tech products.
Employment in high-tech
In 2010, 34 million people were employed in the manufacturing sector in the EU-27, representing 15.9 % of the total employment (see Table 2). Out of 34 million workers, 2.3 million were employed in high-tech manufacturing what equals to 1.1 % of total employment. High-tech KIS sector in 2010 was more than double that of high-tech manufacturing and accounted for 2.7 % of total employment. The shares of both manufacturing and services in the high-technology sectors in total employment varied considerably from one country to another. High-tech manufacturing shares ranged from 0.2 % in Cyprus, 0.3 % in Turkey, 0.4 % in Portugal, Norway and Croatia to 3.1 % in Ireland, 2.8 % in Switzerland and Hungary, and 2.6 % in Malta. Discrepancies in terms of the proportion of high-tech KIS in total employment were also observed across countries. The biggest share of more than 4 % was recorded in Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Iceland, Sweden and Denmark, and the lowest below 1.9 % was found in Portugal, Poland, Greece, Lithuania, Romania and Turkey.
While the manufacturing employment decreased from 2008 by 7.4 %, the high-tech manufacturing recorded a little bit slower fall of 6.0 % at EU level. This decrease in employment can be explained partly by the economical crisis reaching its apogee in 2009 in numerous European countries. The impact of crisis was as well observed in the services sector recording a very slight growth of 0.1 % from 2008 to 2009. Services used to generate new jobs at the pace of 2 % annually until 2008. The mark of the economical crisis can be seen as well in high-technology services (KIS): EU-27 recorded the loss of 0.1 % of jobs in 2009 compared to 2008.
The important differences existed comparing the employment change among countries with big growths in one hand, and equally big decreases in other hand. Nineteen out of thirty-three observed countries registered the fall in employment in high-tech manufacturing with the biggest fall by 38 % in Spain, then by 37 % in Cyprus and Croatia and by 21% in Norway. The biggest growth performed high-tech manufacturing sector in Latvia (15 %), Germany (8 %) and Estonia (5 %). In high-tech KIS the loss was more moderate. Twelve countries registered the decrease. The biggest decrease was the case in Latvia and United Kingdom (-16 %) and Malta (-10 %). The best performing countries in terms of growth of employment in high-tech KIS were: Norway (15 %), Spain (14 %), Slovenia (12 %), Belgium and Czech Republic (10 %).
Table 2 compares as well the percentages of women of both high-tech sectors with respective total of manufacturing or total of services.
In the EU-27, women accounted for 30.0 % of employment in manufacturing and this share reached 37.7 % in high-tech manufacturing. However, even if shares of women were higher in high-tech manufacturing than in manufacturing in almost all the countries excepting Bulgaria and former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, the gender balance was in favor to women (above 50 % of employed) only in four countries: Latvia, Portugal, Slovakia and Czech Republic.
High-tech KIS sector compared to high-tech manufacturing showed lower shares of women in all the countries excepting Finland and Turkey. Moreover, in high-tech KIS none of the countries reached the gender balance. For high-tech KIS the lowest share were found in Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (10 %), the Netherlands (24 %) and Turkey (27 %) and the highest in Estonia (43 %), Bulgaria (43 %), Lithuania (41 %) and Finland (37 %). The reasons behind lower female participation in high-tech KIS lay in the specificities of sectors included in that aggregate: Computer programming, Scientific research and development, Telecommunication and corresponding occupations which apparently remain more popular among men.
High-tech employment at regional level
Figure 2 shows the regional disparities in high-tech sectors (by NACE Rev. 2) as a share of total employment. This figure plots the national average for each country as well as the regions with the lowest and highest shares of employment in high-tech sectors. High-tech sectors (high-tech manufacturing and high-tech KIS) represented 3.7 % of total employment in 2009 with two-thirds of persons occupied in high-tech knowledge-intensive services one-third occupied in high-tech manufacturing.
As seen on the figure the national and regional highest and lowest shares vary significantly from country to another and the significant disparities can be observed at the regional level in the countries.
In regards to national averages, 16 out of 32 observed countries registered values higher than the EU-27 average (3.7 %) with the rates of more than 5.0% in Denmark, Malta, Finland, Sweden, Iceland and Switzerland. On the other range of the scale, the lowest national shares of high-tech sectors in total employment below 2.5 % were registered in Greece, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania and Turkey. It must be noted that 6 European countries (Estonia, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg and Malta) and Iceland are classified at NUTS 1 level.
At regional level, urban regions, especially capital regions or regions situated close to capitals, often exhibit high shares of employment in high-tech sectors. Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire (United Kingdom), situated in close proximity to London, stood out with 10.0 % of its labour force in high-tech sectors. No other region had a share above 10 %, the next closest regions being Comunidad de Madrid (ES) with 9.3 %, Hovedstaden (DK) with 9.2 % and Province Brabant Wallon (BE) (9.1 %). By contrast, the lowest shares of less than 1 % were registered in Trabzon (TR), Sud-Muntenia (RO), Centro (P) (PT), Świętokrzyskie (PL) and Lubelskie (PL). Spain, United Kingdom, Denmark, Belgium and Sweden, first four are countries with the highest regional employment in high-tech sectors, plus Italy and France showed the biggest regional disparities when measured by the ratio of highest share to the lowest share. The lowest discrepancies in employment between regions were observed in Norway, Finland, Slovenia, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Ireland.
Data sources and availability
High-tech statistics uses various other domains and sources mainly within Eurostat's official statistics (CIS, COMEXT, HRST, LFS, SBS, SES, PAT and R & D). Its coverage and availability is therefore dependent on these other primary sources.
The sectoral approach is an aggregation of manufacturing industries according to technological intensity (R & D expenditure/value added) and based on the Statistical classification of economic activities in the European Community (NACE) at 2- or 3-digit level for compiling aggregates related to high-technology, medium high-technology, medium low-technology and low-technology. Services are mainly aggregated into knowledge-intensive services (KIS) and less knowledge-intensive services (LKIS) and defined according to a similar logic at NACE 2-digit level.
Note that due to the revision of NACE from NACE Rev. 1.1 to NACE Rev. 2 the definition of high-technology industries and knowledge-intensive services has changed. For high-tech statistics this means that two different definitions (one according NACE Rev. 1.1 and one according NACE Rev. 2) will be used in paralell as long as necessary. The data in this article, regarding economic statistics on high tech sectors are defined by NACE Rev. 1.1, the data regarding employment in high-tech are according NACE Rev.2.
The product approach was devised to complement the sectoral approach. The product list is based on the calculations of R & D intensity by groups of products (R & D expenditure/total sales). The groups classified as high-technology products are aggregated on the basis of the Standard international trade classification (SITC). The product approach is used for data on high-tech trade.
Due to the revision of SITC from SITC Rev. 3 to SITC Rev. 4 the definition of high-tech products has also changed. The data in this article are according SITC Rev. 4.
High-tech patents and biotechnology patents are defined according to the patent approach. The groups are aggregated on the basis of the International patent classification (IPC) - 8th edition. Biotechnology patents are also aggregated on the basis of the IPC - 8th edition.
For more detailed information of the various high-tech definitions see:
- High-tech aggregation by NACE Rev. 1.1
- High-tech aggregation by NACE Rev. 2
- High-tech aggregation by SITC Rev. 3
- High-tech aggregation by SITC Rev. 4
- High-tech aggregations by patents
Context
Creating, exploiting and commercialising new technologies has become essential in the global race for competitiveness. High-technology or 'high-tech' sectors are key drivers of economic growth, productivity and social protection, and are generally a source of high value added and well-paid employment. Technology-intensive enterprises are often referred to as 'high-technology' – or 'high-tech' – companies.
But what exactly is high-tech? Eurostat collects all available high-tech statistics for the European Union under the more formal name 'Statistics on high-tech industry and knowledge-intensive services' and defines high-tech according to three approaches: the sector approach, the product approach and the patent approach. The sector approach looks at: the high-tech manufacturing sector, medium high-tech manufacturing sector, and high-tech knowledge-intensive service sector, focusing on employment, earnings and economic indicators as shown in Table 1. The product approach looks simply at whether a product is a high-tech product or not and examines trade in high-tech products. The patent approach looks at whether a patent is a high-tech patent or not and also defines what biotechnology patents are.
EP/Council Decision 1608/2003 concerning the production and development of Community statistics on science and technology and Commission Regulation 753/2004 addressing statistics on science and technology determine the production and development of statistics on high-tech (in particular with regard to activities, products, contribution to the whole economy, etc.).
Further Eurostat information
Publications
- Science, technology and innovation in Europe - Pocketbook, 2011 edition
Main tables
- Science and technology, see:
- High-tech industry and knowledge-intensive services (t_htec)
Database
- Science and technology, see:
- High-tech industry and knowledge-intensive services (htec)
- High-tech industries and knowledge-intensive services: economic statistics at national level (htec_eco)
- High-tech industries and knowledge-intensive services: employment statistics at national and regional level (htec_emp)
- High-tech industries and knowledge-intensive services: science and technology statistics at national and regional level (htec_sti)
Dedicated section
Methodology / Metadata
- High-tech industry and knowledge-intensive services (ESMS metadata file - htec_esms)
Other information
- Decision 1608/2003 of 22 July 2003 concerning the production and development of Community statistics on science and technology (Legal text)
- Regulation 753/2004 of 22 April 2004 implementing Decision 1608/2003/EC as regards statistics on science and technology (Legal text)
External links
- European Commission - Enterprise and Industry - Industrial innovation: Innovation Union Scoreboard
- OECD - Statistical analysis of science, technology and industry