And this is a good result: Poland among the three fastest developing countries
Poland was the largest beneficiary of EU membership among all the countries in the region that joined the Community in 2004 and later. For twenty years, Poland has been overtaken in terms of the pace of economic development by only two countries also belonging to the European Union.
In connection with the twentieth anniversary of Poland's accession to the European Union, Bank Pekao SA analysts analyzed how well we used this time in the economic sphere, focusing mainly on the perspective of enterprises and presenting key successes, but also challenges by sector.
Poland: leader in economic growth
Many economic indicators prove that Poland was the largest beneficiary of EU membership among all the countries in the region that joined the Community in 2004 and later. Between 2004 and 2022, our country's GDP increased exactly twice. Moreover, other new member states from our region were far behind Poland in terms of economic growth rate – e.g. the economies of the Czech Republic and Hungary grew only by about half during this time.
– Poland took third place, and only Malta and Ireland overtook us – says Krzysztof Mrówczyński, sector analysis manager, Bank Pekao SA, in an interview with MarketNews24. – Both of these countries owe their growth to tax preferences towards large foreign companies and foreign capital.
However, the largest EU economies, i.e. France, Germany and Spain – as shown in the report “20 years of Poland in the European Union from the perspective of enterprises and economic sectors” – grew by only 20-25 percent during this time. The Italian economy has grown only 3% over these 20 years.
