Statistics Explained

Archive:Water collection, treatment and supply statistics - NACE Rev. 2

Data from April 2013. Most recent data: Further Eurostat information, Main tables and Database.

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This article presents an overview of statistics for the water collection, treatment and supply sector (hereafter referred to as the water supply sector) in the European Union (EU), as covered by NACE Rev. 2 Division 36. It should be noted that some water, particularly when used in production processes, does not come from the public water supply system, but rather is extracted directly from its source. Among the key issues that affect this sector are pricing and the metering of water use in the context of the efficient use of water resources, and also the costs of water services.

Table 1: Key indicators, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), EU-27, 2010 - Source: Eurostat (sbs_na_ind_r2)
Table 2a: Key indicators, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), 2010 - Source: Eurostat (sbs_na_ind_r2)
Table 2b: Key indicators, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), 2010 - Source: Eurostat (sbs_na_ind_r2)
Table 3: Key size class indicators, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), EU-27, 2010 - Source: Eurostat (sbs_sc_ind_r2)
Figure 1: Relative importance of enterprise size classes, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), EU-27, 2010 (1)
(% share of sectoral total) - Source: Eurostat (sbs_sc_ind_r2)
Table 4a: Employment by enterprise size class, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), 2010 - Source: Eurostat (sbs_sc_ind_r2)
Table 4b: Value added by enterprise size class, water collection, treatment and supply (NACE Division 36), 2010 - Source: Eurostat (sbs_sc_ind_r2)

Main statistical findings

Structural profile

The number of enterprises classified to the water supply sector (Division 36) in the EU-27 in 2010 was 14.0 thousand. Employment in this sector was 376 thousand persons and value added was EUR 29.7 billion. As such, the water supply sector employed 0.3 % of the non-financial business economy (Sections B to J and L to N and Division 95) workforce and 28.3 % of the water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities (Section E) workforce.

The apparent labour productivity of the EU-27’s water supply sector in 2010 was relatively high, at EUR 79 thousand per person employed. Bearing this in mind, average personnel costs were quite modest, at EUR 31.8 thousand per employee, the same as the water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities average, and only slightly above the EUR 30.9 thousand per employee average for the whole of the non-financial business economy.

Due to the relatively restrained average personnel costs and high apparent labour productivity the EU-27 water supply sector reported a wage-adjusted labour productivity ratio that, at 248.8 %, was far higher than the non-financial business economy average (144.8 %) and also above the water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities average (200 %).

The gross operating rate (the relation between the gross operating surplus and turnover) in the EU-27’s water supply sector was also relatively high, at 29.8 %. For comparison, the equivalent rate for the non-financial business economy average in 2010 was nearly two thirds lower than this at 10.1 %. It should be noted that this measure does not take account of depreciation or financial expenditure which are typically high in capital-intensive activities, such as the water supply sector with its extensive network infrastructure.

Country analysis

The organisation of the water supply sector takes many different forms, with state-owned, private and mutual enterprises, as well as municipalities involved in terms of the ownership and/or operation of infrastructure. As a result, the number of enterprises classified to the water supply sector and their size varies greatly between EU Member States, reflecting whether or not this is a service provided by a large number of local suppliers or a relatively small number of regional or national (even international) suppliers. This diversity can be illustrated by an analysis of the average number of persons employed per enterprise, which ranged from less than five in Ireland and Austria (both 4.2), Finland (4.1) and Denmark (1.2) to more than 200 in Bulgaria (217.1) and Slovakia (254.7).

In employment terms, there were six EU Member States that reported relatively large water supply sector workforces, ranging from just under 30 thousand persons in Italy, through 33.1 thousand in Poland, 34.9 thousand in Romania and 35.7 thousand in Germany, to more than 40 thousand in Spain and France; note that no data are available for the United Kingdom. In value added terms, the United Kingdom stood out, with EUR 8.3 billion in 2010, a 27.8 % share of the EU-27 total.

The relative importance of the water supply sector was highest, in value added terms, in Lithuania, Bulgaria and Estonia where it accounted for 1.0 % of non-financial business economy value added in 2010. The least specialised EU Member States, by this measure, were Luxembourg, Sweden and Ireland, where the water supply sector contributed less than 0.2 % of non-financial business economy value added, as was the case in Switzerland and Norway.

Several EU Member States recorded particularly high wage-adjusted labour productivity ratios for the water supply sector in 2010. For example, Denmark and Cyprus recorded wage-adjusted labour productivity ratios of 486.80 % and 388.5 % respectively, the second highest wage-adjusted labour productivity ratios recorded for both of these Member States in 2010 among all non-financial business economy NACE divisions. Wage-adjusted labour productivity rates in the water supply sector that were more than 100 percentage points above national averages were also recorded in Estonia, Finland, the Netherlands and Austria. While the lowest wage-adjusted labour productivity ratio for any EU Member State in the water supply sector was 132.4 % for Slovenia, Norway recorded a rate of 101.7 %.

In terms of the gross operating rate, a high level was observed in nearly all EU Member States: the exception was Ireland where the 10.4 % rate for water supply was 4.1 percentage points below the Irish non-financial business economy average in 2010. Norway recorded a particularly low gross operating rate for the water supply sector, just 1.2 %, well below its 17.8 % average for the whole of its non-financial business economy. By contrast, exceptionally high gross operating rates were recorded in Estonia (56.5 %), the United Kingdom (56.4 %) and Finland (42.9 %); for these three Member States, these latest values marked the highest gross operating rates recorded for any of the NACE divisions within the non-financial business economy.

Size class analysis

The water supply sector is dominated by large enterprises (employing 250 or more persons) — which is perhaps unsurprising given the considerable investment required for long-term projects that aim to develop production facilities and distribution networks. There were around 300 large enterprises within the EU-27’s water supply sector in 2010. Together they employed nearly a quarter of a million persons — equivalent to almost two in every three (63.1 %) of the total number of persons employed. In terms of their contribution to sectoral value added in the EU-27, the share of large enterprises was broadly similar, at 65.8 %. The relative importance of large enterprises to the water supply sector can be seen by comparing with the overall contribution of large enterprises to the EU-27’s non-financial business economy workforce (32.5 %) and non-financial business economy value added (42.3 %).

Large enterprises provided more than half of the water supply sector’s workforce in 10 of the EU Member States for which data are available in 2010 (see Table 4a), with the share rising above four fifths in Belgium (2009 data), Romania, the Netherlands and Bulgaria. Medium-sized enterprises (employing 50 to 249 persons) employed more than half of the workforce in Slovenia and Sweden, while small enterprises (employing 10 to 49 persons) employed the majority of the workforce in Cyprus. All of the enterprises within the Irish water supply sector were micro enterprises, in other words employing fewer than 10 persons.

The distribution of value added by enterprise size class within the water supply sectors of the EU Member States was generally quite similar to that recorded for employment. However, large enterprises in Belgium recorded a much lower share of sectoral value added than they did in employment terms, with medium-sized enterprises contributing a significantly greater share of value added. By contrast, the dominant position of Sweden’s medium-sized enterprises in employment terms was not reflected in their relatively low value added share. In Cyprus, small enterprises were even more dominant in value added terms (87.2 % of the sectoral total) than they were in employment terms.

Data sources and availability

The analysis presented in this article is based on the main dataset for structural business statistics (SBS) and size class data, all of which are published annually.

The main series provides information for each EU Member State as well as a number of non-member countries at a detailed level according to the activity classification NACE. Data are available for a wide range of variables.

In structural business statistics, size classes are generally defined by the number of persons employed. A limited set of the standard structural business statistics variables (for example, the number of enterprises, turnover, persons employed and value added) are analysed by size class, mostly down to the three-digit (group) level of NACE. The main size classes used in this article for presenting the results are:

  • small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs): with 1 to 249 persons employed, further divided into;
    • micro enterprises: with less than 10 persons employed;
    • small enterprises: with 10 to 49 persons employed;
    • medium-sized enterprises: with 50 to 249 persons employed;
  • large enterprises: with 250 or more persons employed.

Context

This article presents an overview of statistics for the water collection, treatment and supply sector in the EU, as covered by NACE Rev. 2 Division 36. This division includes the collection, treatment and distribution of water for domestic and industrial needs. This activity includes the collection of water from rivers, lakes, wells and so on, the collection of rain water, the purification of water for water supply purposes, the treatment of water for industrial and other purposes, the desalting of sea or ground water to produce water as the principal product of interest, the distribution of water through mains, by trucks or other means and the operation of irrigation canals.

This division contains one group and one class only and so there is no analysis of subsectors in this article.

The information that is presented in this article excludes the operation of irrigation equipment for agricultural purposes (which is part of crop and animal production, hunting and related service activities, Division 01). It also excludes the treatment of wastewater in order to prevent pollution (part of sewerage, Division 37) and the (long-distance) transport of water via pipelines (part of the land transport and transport via pipelines sector, Division 49).

See also

Further Eurostat information

Publications

Main tables

Database

SBS - industry and construction (sbs_ind_co)
Annual detailed enterprise statistics - industry and construction (sbs_na_ind)
Annual detailed enterprise statistics for industry (NACE Rev. 2 B-E) (sbs_na_ind_r2)
SMEs - Annual enterprise statistics by size class - industry and construction (sbs_sc_ind)
Industry by employment size class (NACE Rev. 2 B-E) (sbs_sc_ind_r2)
SBS - regional data - all activities (sbs_r)
SBS data by NUTS 2 regions and NACE Rev. 2 (from 2008 onwards) (sbs_r_nuts06_r2)

Dedicated section

Source data for tables and figures (MS Excel)

Other information

External links

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