(Finance) – More construction companies, business consultants and bed & breakfasts. Fewer businesses in trade, agriculture and manufacturing: These are some of the evidences that emerge from the Movimprese data on the trend of business demographics in 2023, processed by Unioncamere and InfoCamere on the basis of the Chambers of Commerce Business Register.
“Being able to count on 42 thousand more businesses at the end of this year, experienced in the name of uncertainty, seems to me to be a good result”, comments the president of Unioncamere, Andrea Prete. “The sectors where the greatest growth is concentrated were largely predictable. Above all, the increase in tourism, by virtue of the post-pandemic recovery, and in business consultancy activities, and, more generally, in professional, scientific and technical activities, characterized by the presence of qualified human capital, capable of contributing significantly to the development”.
In an economic scenario characterized by inflation, geopolitical tensions and technological changes, the 2023 balance for Italian companies remains positive, but not for all areas of activity. Over 70% of the 42 thousand additional companies registered in the last twelve months, in fact, operate in just three macro-sectors: construction, tourism and professional activities.
The most dynamicin terms of entrepreneurial growth, is the construction sector which, despite the uncertainty about the prospects of bonuses linked to the construction world that characterized 2023, at the end of the last twelve months counted 13,541 more companies compared to 2022 ( +1.62%).
Professional, scientific and technical activities also performed well, showing a significant increase of 11 thousand companies at the end of 2023, driven by a “boom” in business and administrative-management consultancy (positive balance of over 6,000 activities and a relative change of 8%) .
A positive year also for the holiday sector, in which there are 3,380 additional accommodation activities (+5.13%) and 3,015 more bars and restaurants compared to 2022 (+0.77%).
Real estate activities also contributed significantly to the growth, which at the end of 2023 had 5,197 more companies than the previous year (+1.72%).
In the face of these positive results, the more traditional sectors continue to report a shrinking of the number of companies. For trade, 2023 ended with an overall reduction of 8,653 activities (-0.6% on an annual basis) but, by analyzing the data further, it can be seen that the selection process in this sector essentially concerned trade retail which lost almost 7,700 units in 2023. In agriculture, the year-end balance sheet shows an overall reduction of 7,546 companies (-1.05%) while manufacturing presents an overall loss of 2,962 companies (-0.56%).
A performance for the latter sector that affects all sectors with the sole exception of machinery and equipment repair, maintenance and installation companies (+1,137 units), accompanied by substantial stability in the shipbuilding, aerospace and rail-tram industries ( +56), drinks (+37).
Looking at the territory, the data indicates that the entrepreneurial fabric of all four geographical areas is growing. With its 14,948 more businesses, the South accounted for more than a third of the entire annual balance, trailing the North-West (+11,210) and the Center (+10,626).
Active business balance sheet for seventeen of the twenty Italian regions. In absolute terms, Lombardy (10,562 more companies), Lazio (+9,710) and Campania (+6,351) did best. Lazio (+1.59%) instead recorded the most sustained growth in relative terms; followed by Lombardy (+1.12%) and Campania (+1.04%).
Reading the data from the point of view of the organizational forms of companies confirms the structural strengthening of the entrepreneurial system, which has been underway for years. The entire positive balance of 2023 is explained by the growth of joint-stock companies: 57,846 more in absolute terms, equal to +3.1% in line with what was recorded in 2022. Individual businesses, which continue to represent half of the stock of existing businesses (50.6%), show instead a a decline of almost 2 thousand units, recording, in relative terms, a decrease of almost 0.1%