THE WORKFORCE AND ITS PRODUCTIVITY IN THE FOOD ECONOMY OF THE EU COUNTRIES

• Main Author: Aldona Mrówczyńska-Kamińska
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Life Sciences in Poznań 2013-09-01
• Series: Journal of Agribusiness and Rural Development
• Subjects: agri-food industry; workforce; internal structure; the share in the national economy; labour productivity
• Online Access: http://www.jard.edu.pl/tom29/zeszyt3/art_8.pdf

The main aim of the article is a comparative analysis of the workforce and its productivity in the food economy of the EU countries in the years 1995 and 2009. The first part of the article analyses the internal structure of the workforce in the food economy and its share in the national economy. In the following part the workforce productivity was estimated, taking into consideration the value of global output and gross value added per employee. The basic source materials used in this study were input-output tables for individual EU countries. The results of the calculations indicate that the internal structure of the workforce in the food economy, its share in the national economy, and the level of the workforce productivity in the EU countries differ considerably. The level of the labour productivity is much higher in the countries of Western and Northern Europe than in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. It is mainly caused by a structural defect which is due to an excessive workforce in the agricultural sector EU member states.