Archive:Fee and contract wholesale trade statistics - NACE Rev. 1.1
This Statistics Explained article is outdated and has been archived - for recent articles on structural business statistics see here.
- Data from January 2009. Most recent data: Further Eurostat information, Main tables and Database.
This article belongs to a set of statistical articles which analyse the structure, development and characteristics of the various economic activities in the European Union (EU). According to the statistical classification of economic activities in the EU (NACE Rev 1.1), the present article covers fee and contract wholesale trade, corresponding to NACE Group 51.1, which is part of the wholesale trade sector. The activities covered in this article are:
- agents trading on behalf and on account of others;
- agents involved in bringing sellers and buyers together;
- agents undertaking commercial transactions on behalf of a principal.
It does not include financial intermediaries such as insurance or real estate agents, nor retail sale by agents.
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Main statistical findings
Structural profile
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The EU-27’s wholesale on a fee or contract basis (NACE Group 51.1) consisted of 548.9 thousand enterprises in 2006, more than three tenths of all wholesale trade (NACE Division 51) enterprises. On average these enterprises were very small, as collectively they generated EUR 221.6 billion of turnover, resulting in EUR 39.5 billion of value added, equivalent to just 4.8 % and 7.6 % of the wholesale trade (NACE Division 51) total. The large difference between these two output shares reflects the fact that this type of wholesaling differs from the own-account wholesale activities, in that the turnover generated reflects only the service provided, and not the cost and margin of the goods purchased and resold. This sector's contribution to the wholesale trade workforce was higher than its contribution to output, but far from its share of the enterprise population: the 975.2 thousand persons employed represented nearly one tenth (9.4 %) of the wholesale trade total. It is likely that a high proportion of persons work part-time in this activity and this could account, in part, account for the relatively low level of apparent labour productivity implied by the high employment and low value added shares.
Italy accounted for slightly less than one third of the EU-27's value added and employment in this sector in 2006. Unsurprisingly, with such a large contribution to the EU-27 total, Italian wholesaling was very concentrated in this form of wholesaling, as this sector generated 2.0 % of Italian non-financial business economy (NACE Sections C to I and K) value added in 2006; this share was higher still in Slovenia, where wholesale on a fee or contract basis accounted for 2.5 % of non-financial business economy value added.
Expenditure and productivity
Although not a typical wholesale trade activity, wholesale trade on a fee or contract basis recorded a pattern of operating and tangible investment expenditure close to the wholesale trade average. The investment rate was 10.2 %, the same as for the wholesale trade sector, while personnel costs accounted for 7.8 % of operating expenditure for wholesale trade on a fee or contract basis, slightly higher than the 6.5 % average for wholesale trade. Average personnel costs for wholesale on a fee or contract basis were EUR 30.4 thousand per employee, and therefore close to the wholesale trade average of EUR 32.6 thousand per employee.
In contrast this sector's productivity level was particularly low, EUR 40.5 thousand per person employed, just over three quarters of the wholesale trade average. As a result, this sector recorded the lowest wage-adjusted labour productivity ratio of any of the wholesale trade activities, just 133.1 %, some 26.7 percentage points below the wholesale trade average.
Data sources and availability
The main part of the analysis in this article is derived from structural business statistics (SBS), including core, business statistics which are disseminated regularly, as well as information compiled on a multi-yearly basis, and the latest results from development projects.
Context
The activities in NACE Division 51 cover all wholesale trade except that concerning motor vehicles and motorcycles: the wholesaling of automotive fuel is considered as a wholesale trade rather than a motor trade. This article covers resale (sale without transformation) of new and used products, as well as wholesale activities carried out on a fee or contract basis.
The wholesaling activity consists of selling to retailers or to industrial, commercial, institutional and professional users. Wholesalers can act on a fee or contract basis as agents (as covered by this article) or for their own account, buying and selling goods. The own-account wholesale sub-sectors distinguish the types of product in which the wholesaler is specialised (agricultural products, consumer goods, intermediate goods, machinery and equipment), while specialised wholesalers of other products are included in non-specialised wholesalers.
In the supply chain, wholesalers are located between producers and users, providing know-how and knowledge in markets for which they have expertise. Competition within the wholesale trade activity is often centred on providing more efficient services or more sophisticated value added services. Wholesalers can provide a range of services from basic storage and break of bulk, sorting, grading and logistics to pre- and post-production operations (for instance, labelling, packaging, bottling and installation).
Further Eurostat information
Publications
- European Business: Facts and figures - 2009 edition