In a statement, PAIH, which oversees foreign investments in Poland, said that last year was a record-breaking one for the agency, with the overall FDI figure surpassing 2020’s result by EUR 800 million and the previous best-ever figure, from 2019, by EUR 700 million.
“It was a golden year for PAIH,” the agency’s CEO Krzysztof Drynda said, adding the new investments in Poland “mean not only money, but also new jobs - around 18,000 of them.”
Piotr Nowak, Poland’s Development and Technology Minister, who supervises PAIH, praised the agency for “efficiently supporting the Polish economy.”
The biggest foreign investor of 2021 was South Korea, whose firms injected EUR 1.9 billion into the Polish economy, creating 1,967 jobs, PAIH said. German companies made EUR 155 million-worth of investments, creating 192 jobs, while American firms shelled out EUR 363,91 million and created 5,414 jobs, the agency added.
Poland turned out to be an attractive place for doing business in such sectors as research and development, business services, electromobility, the automotive industry, the medical industry, electronics, as well as building materials and chemicals, PAIH said in its statement.
96 projects worth EUR 3.5 billion
In all, the country attracted 96 investment projects in 2021, including as many as 37 from Belarus, thanks to a special scheme called Poland.Business Harbour. The scheme has now been extended to other eastern countries, such as Russia, Ukraine, Armenia, Georgia and Moldova, and work is underway on its further enlargement, PAIH noted.
Minister Nowak said the government “is pleased that despite the pandemic, foreign companies regard Poland as an attractive destination.” He noted Poland’s assets included “its young, well-educated people, fast support for investors, market-tailored assistance schemes, such the PAIH-administered government grant, and exemption from corporate-income tax.”
Nowak said that Poland’s public assistance programmes, coupled with the country’s stable economy, “create the ideal environment for foreign investors.”
Meanwhile, PAIH’s Drynda said the agency aimed to break the FDI record again in 2022, as it seeks especially to bring to Poland investors from such “industries of the future” as electromobility, electronics and IT, PAIH’s statement added.
(pm)
Source: paih.gov.pl