Women in business in Poland | Statistics 2023
How many businesses are women-owned in Poland, 2023? Here is the annual Women in Business in Poland 2023 report, which presents data and statistics on what percentage of business owners are female and what is the gender ratio in particular types of Polish companies.
Data on women’s entrepreneurship in Poland 2023
In accordance with the annual tradition of Transparent Data, as a company information provider from Poland, we decided to review the data that we share with enterprises of various sizes through APIs and Business Registers 360 databases in terms of extracting information typically about women and their participation in Polish business. As always, we used two data sources:
1) the National Court Register of Poland (KRS — Krajowy Rejestr Sądowy), which contains information about all commercial companies,
2) Central Registration and Information on Economic Activity of Poland (CEIDG — Centralna Ewidencja i Informacja o Działalności Gospodarczej), in which all Polish sole proprietorships are registered.
Information from both of these credible business registers can serve as an indicator of the growing (or decreasing) women’s entrepreneurship in Poland.
How many businesses are women-owned in Poland, 2023?
According to data from CEIDG business register, from the beginning of 2023, over 0.94 million women in Poland are owners of actively operating sole proprietorships. There are almost twice as many men running this type of micro business, i.e. 1.8 million. In total, therefore, women constitute approx. 34% of all owners of sole proprietorships in Poland.
If we look at the management boards of commercial companies***, women constitute 25%. The number of women on the boards of Polish companies in the first quarter of 2023 is 194,000 compared to 586,000 men.
*** The list includes all currently active Polish limited liability companies (pl: spółki z ograniczoną odpowiedzialnością), joint-stock companies (pl: spółki akcyjne), simple joint-stock companies (pl: proste spółki akcyjne), general partnerships (pl: spółki jawne), partnership companies (pl: spółki partnerskie), limited partnerships (pl: spółki komandytowe) and limited joint-stock partnerships (pl: spółki komandytowo-akcyjne), as well as branches of a foreign entrepreneur.
What percentage of business owners are female? Number of women on the boards of commercial companies in Poland 2023
Another issue worth analyzing are business women who sit on the boards of Polish companies registered in the National Court Register. The percentage share of women in the management staff varies depending on the legal form of the company — the largest number of women run businesses of the type of partnership and general partnership.
The percentage of women on company boards in Polish businesses is as follows:
- in partnership companies, women account for 46% of the composition of the management board — there are over 2.5 thousand of them, with less than 5.6 thousand of all board members, regardless of gender,
- in general partnerships, women account for 33% of the composition of the management board — there are over 22.6 thousand of them, with 69.3 thousand registered members of the management board regardless of gender,
- in limited liability companies, women account for 24% of the composition of the management board — there are over 162.1 thousand of them, with less than 671.6 thousand of all board members, regardless of gender,
- in simple joint-stock companies, women account for 20% of the composition of the management board — there are less than 0.4 thousand of them, with over 1.9 thousand of all management board members, regardless of gender,
- in joint-stock companies, women account for 16% of the composition of the management board — there are over 2,200 of them, with less than 14,000 all members of the management board, regardless of gender,
- in limited joint-stock partnerships, women account for 13% of the management board — there are over 0.5 thousand of them, with over 4.3 thousand of all board members, regardless of gender,
- in limited partnerships, women account for 7% of the management board — there are over 2.7 thousand of them, with over 38.3 thousand of all board members, regardless of gender,
- for comparison, in branches of a foreign entrepreneur operating in Poland, women account for 10% of the composition of the management board — there are less than 0.6 thousand of them, where all members of the management board, regardless of gender, are less than 6.1 thousand.
How many Polish companies are run exclusively by women? Number of companies with 100% female management in 2023
An interesting statistic is also how many women in Poland run a business, in the sense of managing companies completely without the participation of men in the management board. According to data from the Polish National Court Register from the beginning of 2023, the management board, 100% composed exclusively of women, had:
- 74.7 thousand limited liability companies,
- 2.6 thousand general partnerships,
- 1.25 thousand limited partnerships,
- 691 joint-stock companies,
- 534 partnership companies,
- 260 limited joint-stock partnerships,
- 122 branches of a foreign entrepreneur.
In Poland, there are still definitely fewer women running enterprises than men.
Women in business in Poland — statistics from 2022
Statistics from the Women in Business in Poland 2023 report is also worth comparing to the data on how many businesses were women-owned in this country last year. The proportions have not changed dramatically.
In the first quarter of 2022:
- 875,000 women were owners of sole proprietorships; for comparison, there were 1.7 million men running this type of small business in Poland;
- 24% of management boards of commercial companies in Poland were women; 76% of the board members were men.
For more detailed data on the number of women in particular types of companies in Poland, please refer to our last year’s article:
“Business women” is the number of women running companies understood as owners, CEOs and members of management boards
At the end of our article, let us also note that when considering how many women are in business, it should be remembered that businesses are not only commercial companies, but also sole proprietorships. Most reports on the number of women running companies provide only the first data, but as we have already shown in a separate report, Polish Companies 2022, it is the activities in Poland that are the most numerous and they are not always really “one-man”. Women can be not only “their own bosses”, but also employ several or even a dozen people.
In the case of analyzing data from CEIDG, it is quite easy to indicate the owner — the company is registered for this person.
In the case of preparing statistics from the National Court Register, the matter is not so obvious, because there are various management positions in companies — women who are members of the company’s management board can be both owners and CEOs, proxies or be mentioned in the ownership structure simply as board members. In our report Women in Business in Poland 2023, when analyzing data from the National Court Register, we took into account women holding all possible managerial positions.
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