Poland looks to be weathering the world economic crisis better than many emerging economies, with GDP growth expected to be in the range of 2.5-3.5% in 2009, less than in recent years, but still well into Positive territory.

Readers of the Guardian newspaper in Britain have voted Krakow their 2nd favourite overseas city in an annual survey. More than 17000 readers completed the questionnaire for the newspaper.

 

Over the past few years, the companies which have been researching the residential property market in Poland have only presented average prices which are taken from the selling market, regardless of whether the apartments are sold or not.


This has not represented the true situation on the market, as it includes many overpriced apartments which will never sell. New research from the consultancy Rednet, however, has now compared three prices - the average price of apartments for sale in the selling offer (OFFER price), the average price of apartments actually sold (SOLD price), and the average price of apartments introduced in the primary market, those available from developers (DEVELOPER price). Some surprising results can be observed across Poland.

Research by the Polish bank Dom has shown that every second Pole living and working in the UK is saving for an apartment or house in Poland. The survey was carried out in April this year at a large property exhibition at London Olympia Conference Centre.

The survey found that 37 percent of Poles plan to live in the UK for a specific period of time and then return to Poland, while 16% said they will buy property as an investment and let it out.

Figures from the Central Statistics Office (GUS) show that the unemployment rate in Poland fell to 9.5% in June from the 10.0% figure recorded in May.

The same office also reported that Polish labor productivity rose 5.0% year on year in the January-June period. The average employment rate increased by 3.3% in the period in question, while gross wages rose by 10.9%.

The Krakow based IBM software development laboratory (the company's only such lab in the CEE region) is set to expand with the hiring of an additional 100 employees. The company is seeking software development managers, testers and service consultants. The lab is located in Krakow to tap into the large number of highly skilled university graduates being produced here and in Slask. Employment in the lab is set to increase by 20% per annum for the next few years.

The Institute for Market Economics (IBnGR) has published forecasts for GDP growth in Poland over full year 2008, predicting a rise of 5.5%. Domestic demand is to be the big driver of growth in 2008-2009. Unemployment is set to continue falling, reaching 8.2% in 2009. The Polish zloty is expected to remain strong against major currencies.

Here we present an update on some of the economic stories making news in Poland in recent weeks.

This week, the president of UEFA, Michel Platini, was in Poland to meet the Prime Minister, Donald Tusk, and President, Lech Kaczynski, and check on Poland's progress in preparations to host the 2012 EURO football tournament (Poland will host jointly with Ukraine).

In May, the unemployment rate in Poland fell to 10%, a half a percent drop from April. The current number of unemployed in Poland stands at 1.5m, according to the central statistics office.

The same office also reported a 4.9% rise in Poland's labor productivity year-on-year in the January-May period.

The average employment rate increased by 3.5% in the period in question, while gross wages grew by 11.0%.