Foreign Entrepreneurship growth in Italy

According to the recent report “Foreign Entrepreneurship in Italy: an overview using Business Register Data” published by Infocamere, the number of foreign companies registered with the Chamber of Commerce’s Business Register has reached 659,709, representing 11% of the total number of businesses in the country. Of these, 522,055 are of non-EU nationality, accounting for 79% of the total number of foreign businesses.

In 2023, the driving sectors of foreign entrepreneurship were construction and agriculture, showing a 5% annual increase each, representing 24% and 4% of the total respectively. Although experiencing a slight slowdown of 0.5%, commercial sector remains the most representative with nearly 203,000 businesses, while the manufacturing industry maintained a 0.5% growth rate, with over 49,000 active businesses.

From a territorial standpoint, Lombardy confirms itself as the area with the highest concentration of foreign businesses, representing 31% of the total and showing an annual growth of 3.8%, higher than the regions of the Northeast (+1.4%) and the South (+1.1%). Analysing individual enterprises, it emerges that Morocco, Romania, and China are the countries of origin of the majority of business owners, representing 34% of the total, followed by Albania, Bangladesh, and Pakistan (19%), and Egypt, Nigeria, and Senegal (11%).