The initial findings from the International Business Report (IBR) from Grant Thornton International published today (10 January) show that medium to large privately held businesses around the world are considerably more optimistic about the prospects for their economies in 2007 - with an optimism/pessimism balance percentage (*see note below) of +45%, up from +39% last year.  The survey, which covers the opinions of 7,200 business leaders in 32 countries, represents 81% of global GDP.

For the first time in its five year history the Grant Thornton International league table shows the EU (at a balance of +46%) is more optimistic than the US (at a balance of +14%). The findings reflect the growing confidence of EU economies in the past year, in particular Germany +66% (+41% in 2006), France +30% (+1% in 2006) and Italy +21% (-8% in 2006).  

In Poland although overall optimism amongst mid corporate business owners in the 32 countries surveyed by Grant Thornton has grown by 6% percentage points and in the EU by 29% the growth of optimism in Poland for 2007 is only 17%
For the first time in 12 years Polish businessmen were specifically asked how politics impacted on their level of optimism for the next year. Overall 54% of respondents and 63 % of exporters stated that politics had a negative effect
Andrew Kinast – managing partner of Grant Thornton in Poland said that “the ongoing political crisis and lack of clear direction had a clear impact on the potential for growth as evidenced by business optimism. Poland has fallen from the 18th  most optimistic country to 23rd.  It now lags the EU in general. Clearly the Polish economy needs to grow and indeed has the potential to grow by 8 to 10% per annum, a figure necessary to catch up the “old” EU in a reasonable time scale. Given that Polish businessmen have historically indicated bureaucracy as the greatest barrier to growth the current lack of any action by the government must be worrying. Andrew Kinast added that Poland had benefited in the last two years from significant DFI into Poland by European mid corporates. Many investments do not show up in official data. Decisions to invest are typically taken with a two year lead time to realisation and evidence from enquiries from Grant Thornton clients indicate in the last several months that the scale of inward investment may be slowing.
Clearly the government needs to work on its own and Poland’s image abroad and needs to address the burden of bureaucracy, unclear tax legislation and the general anti business climate amongst civil servants. Otherwise Poland is in danger on missing out on the opportunities which the significant growth in optimism in Germany of 25% and Poland’s largest export market offers”.