According to INSTAT, during 2021, more than 15,000 new enterprises were registered in Albania, bringing the total to 118,627 in a country with a population of 2.7 million.
The data also found there were almost 63,000 farmers registered with a tax number, bringing the total number to more than 181,500.
The number of businesses registered in the country demonstrated an increase of 1.1% compared to 2020, with the largest business type those of service providers. Unsurprisingly, the capital of Tirana has the highest concentration of enterprises.
While the numbers are promising, enterprises with more than 50 employees account for only 1.7% of the total. These contribute to around 51.1% of the total employment in 2021, down slightly from the year before.
Over 5% are joint foreign ventures with 40% being with Italians and 5% from Greece. This is the largest number recorded in Albanian history.
According to the data, some 6,635 enterprises were of this type, an in increase of 10% on the previous year. A drop had been registered in 2020 due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the increase far surpasses that rate of 6.4%.
In terms of types of business, the IT sector witnessed positive growth of 22%, correlating to 97 new enterprises. While this is positive, it is also due in part to foreign companies looking for cheap labour. The sector is plagued with other difficulties as many educated and highly-skilled professionals opt to work abroad for significantly higher salaries.
As for farmers, the amount that have started working with a tax number has increased significantly between 2020 and 2021 , at a rate of 28.3% to 62,922. Lushnje had the largest number of registered farmers. Out of the total almost 30% work on mixed purpose farms.
Women managed just 10% of farms and only 31% of total enterprises.
Overall, 700,763 people are employed, hinting at the presence of a large, informal economy despite efforts to reduce it.
