This Monday begins the 41st Meeting of the Cercle d'Economia, one of the most relevant events of the year for the country's business, economic, and institutional ecosystem. One of the few spaces where politics, business, academia, and civil society converge to discuss the major issues that condition the economic future of Catalonia and Spain, with an eye on Europe.
And often—not by its own decision, but almost by tradition—the annual meetings of the Cercle end up being held amidst particularly turbulent contexts. Recent editions have coincided with municipal, Catalan, state, or European elections, a fact that has ended up shifting much of the attention towards the political movements of the moment. And everything indicates that this edition will not be immune to speculation either: the possibility of an eventual early election in Spain will hover over many of the conversations that will take place these days at the Palau de Congressos de Catalunya.
However, if political noise allows and remains at a moderate volume, this year's edition could be a good opportunity to recover one of the Cercle's most valuable functions: long-term thinking. To escape, even if only for three days, the dictatorship of urgency to discuss the ideas that should help interpret the future. Or, put another way, to try to answer the big question with which the Cercle has wanted to focus this year's debate: how can Europe remain competitive in an increasingly fragmented, technologically accelerated, and geopolitically uncertain world?
And the answer will not only be formulated on stage, but will be built among attendees, as is customary, in the hallways, in improvised coffee breaks between sessions, and during the lunches that accompany the official program. And this year there are three documents from the economic sphere that will probably join many of these conversations: the traditional Cercle d'Economia Opinion Note, the Fènix Report, and the Industrial Barometer from Cecot. All three, despite coming from very different spaces, seem to converge on some common concerns: productivity, competitiveness, and the ability to generate more added value.
Europe facing the need for change
As usual, the Cercle has sought to set the coordinates of the debate before the annual meeting begins. And this year it has done so with an opinion note titled Europe facing the need for change. A document that starts from a realization: the world on which the European project was built is changing at a speed that seemed unthinkable just a few years ago. The war in Ukraine, the return of Donald Trump to the White House, increasing competition with China, and the emergence of technologies such as artificial intelligence are forcing Europe to rethink its governance and its role in the world.
Given this scenario, the Cercle advocates for the need to advance towards greater European strategic autonomy. The document insists that the great challenge is not so much to protect Europe as to finish building it. Completing the single market in areas such as telecommunications, energy, or capital markets, strengthening common industrial policy, and creating the conditions for companies capable of competing on a global scale to emerge are some of the central axes of the proposal.
And far from limiting itself to a defensive view, the Cercle believes that this process also opens a window of opportunities for Spain and Catalonia, especially in areas such as renewable energies, biotechnology, health sciences, and digital infrastructures.
The underlying idea is clear: Europe will only be able to maintain its prosperity model if it is capable of gaining dimension, innovation, and competitiveness. And this concern is precisely what connects the Cercle's note with the other two reports.
The Phoenix Report: when the problem is productivity
If the opinion note looks at Europe, the Phoenix Report turns its gaze towards Catalonia and its structural economic model. And it does so with a much more forceful, even alarmist, tone. The issue of productivity, however, is not new for the Cercle. It was the central theme of the 2024 annual meeting and continues to occupy a prominent place in the entity's reflections. In fact, this year's Opinion Note once again warns about the structural problems of productivity, R&D investment, and business size that the Spanish economy faces.
In this case, the Phoenix Report, which has been coordinated by Xavier Roig and prepared by economists Xavier Cuadras, Modest Guinjoan, and Miquel Puig, with the advice of Jordi Galí, Guillem López-Casasnovas, and Jaume Ventura, starts from a provocative idea: Catalonia has been growing for years, but not necessarily with prosperity.
"The Phoenix Report warns that economic growth has relied too much on population increase and too little on productivity gains"
The authors question one of the most repeated ideas of recent decades: that GDP growth is, by itself, good news. What they propose is to look at another variable, GDP per capita, and it is here that they detect a progressive deterioration of Catalonia's relative position. According to the report, the main problem is that economic growth has relied too much on population increase and too little on productivity gains.
The analysis is particularly interesting because it does not attribute this phenomenon to a supposed deindustrialization of the country. In fact, one of its conclusions is precisely the opposite: Catalonia has maintained a relevant and competitive industrial base. The problem, the authors argue, is that a growing part of economic activity has concentrated in sectors with low productivity levels and modest wages, which limits the capacity to generate long-term prosperity and fiscal resources.
It is here that the theses that have generated the most debate appear. The report identifies several sectors that it considers "highly subsidized" because the wages they generate do not provide enough tax revenue to sustain the most basic public services. A controversial reflection, but one that has served to reopen a debate that has been recurring in the Catalan economy for a long time: what growth model does Catalonia need to continue generating well-being.
Catalan industry resists
The third document comes from a perspective much closer to the day-to-day life of companies. The Industrial Barometer of Cecot, directed for the first time by Oriol Montanyà, offers a detailed radiography of the state of Catalan industry and provides a more optimistic view than that of the Fénix Report. The picture it draws is that of a resilient industry, capable of maintaining record levels of exports, employment, and activity despite an international context marked by geopolitical uncertainty, energy volatility, and rising costs.
And the document, in fact, also questions some of the most pessimistic discourses about the industry. Although the number of industrial companies has decreased in recent decades, Cecot interprets this evolution more as a process of transformation and consolidation than as deindustrialization. In fact, in recent years, the weight of medium and large companies has increased, while the loss has been concentrated mainly in the smallest ones.
This does not mean that there are no concerns. The barometer itself identifies several structural challenges: access to talent, the increase in energy costs, the difficulty in finding qualified technical profiles, and the need to accelerate technological transformation. But it also detects opportunities linked to digitalization, automation, innovation, and internationalization.
In a way, the conclusion of the document coincides with that of the other two reports: "It's not just about growing, but about growing better, generating more value and productivity," as Cecot president, Xavier Panés, stated on the day of the presentation. It's not just about growing, but about creating the conditions for the economy to be more productive, more innovative, and more competitive.
From diagnosis to recipes
The three documents also agree on another issue: the time for diagnoses is starting to run out. And for that reason, all three propose clear ideas to move from diagnosis to action. We summarize 10:
- Complete the European single market in energy, telecommunications, and capital markets (Cercle).
- Promote a European industrial policy with more coordination and shared funding (Cercle).
- Increase investment in R&D and innovation (Cercle + Cecot).
- Facilitate the growth of companies so they gain size and scale (Cercle + Fènix).
- Accelerate digitalization and industrial automation (Cecot).
- Strengthen technical training and the availability of qualified talent (Cecot).
- Reorient the economic model towards higher value-added sectors (Fènix).
- Link migration policy to productivity and qualification needs (Fènix).
- Review tax and regulatory incentives that favor low-productivity activities (Fènix).
- Place productivity as the main indicator of future prosperity (all three).
Three reports, a shared diagnosis, and a debate that these days will circulate through the corridors of the Cercle almost as much as any speech on stage.