Statistical, Ecosystems and Competitiveness Analysis of the Media and Content Industries: The Newspaper Publishing Industry

Statistical, Ecosystems and Competitiveness Analysis of the Media and Content Industries 
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Figure 27: Percentage unique visitors top 100 newspaper websites
Source: TNO based on WAN-IFRA data, 2010. 
The figures seem to indicate that on the internet European newspapers have a better market 
position, at least in terms of readers, than Asian and US newspapers. The problem for online 
news of course is that a good position in terms of readership, does not automatically equal 
good (or even any) revenues. A shortcoming of these data is also that pure internet players are 
not included, and therefore the figures do not provide a complete picture of online news 
consumption in the respective countries. 
4.4 
EU27 internal and external trade in newspapers 
Trade figures within the EU are an indicator for the presence of a single market, trade figures 
from the EU to non-EU countries are an indicator of the relative strength of the EU – or 
individual countries within the EU – compared to non-EU countries. 
Table 14 shows an overall negative trade balance (trade deficit) for the publishing of 
newspapers in 2007 of 237 million Euros. The trade deficit grew by an average of 10.6% 
annually. The trade balance for the economy as a whole improved, the trade deficit decreased 
by 2.7% annually. 
Table 14: Trade balance and annual average growth rate for the EU27 MCI industry 
Trade balance 
2007 
Annual average growth rate, 1995-2007 
million EUR 
% 
Publishing of newspapers 
-237 
10.6 
Total EU economy 
-71,324 
-2.7 
Source: Eurostat. 
Figure 28 shows how the trade balance for newspaper publishing grew from a negative figure 
in 1995 to a positive figure in 1999. It dropped sharply in 2002 and rose again in 2003 to a 
peak in 2006, after which it dropped even sharper. 

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