Reshoring in Europe: Overview 2015–2018

Reshoring – namely the relocation of value chain activities back to the home country or its nearby region – has attracted an increasing interest both among scholars and policymakers. The European Reshoring Monitor is a collaborative project between Eurofound and a consortium of Italian universities aiming to monitor reshoring cases in Europe. This 2018 annual report provides a holistic and longitudinal overview of EU reshoring trends and characteristics by examining reshoring cases (from 2014 to 2018), policy initiatives, and the related literature. In quantitative terms, reshoring appears to be substantially stable, while qualitatively significant changes emerge relative to target countries, sectors and motivations. Reshoring flows have broadened to encompass northern and eastern Europe. The concentration in labour-intensive sectors observed in the past has declined. Cost factors that dominated the first wave of the phenomenon have today given way to factors linked to the global reorganisation of value chain activities.