Page 47 - CE Outlook Regions 2023

Czech army in 2022 for the supply of Tatra vehicles. CSG has been
expanding abroad and also offered to take over Explosia, the
state-owned Semtex explosives manufacturer.

The largest company on the market Skoda Auto is switching to the euro
currency from January 2023 as most of its sales are in the euro
currency and this trend is rising with the rise of electric car sales.

The Czech cabinet has proposed a location near Pilsen to Skoda Auto’s
parent company Volkswagen, which late in 2022 refrained from making
a decision as to its immediate “Gigafactory” electric battery plant
construction plans in Europe. The cabinet views the Gigafactory project
as a key one for the transformation of the Czech automobile industry,
which represents a quarter of the country’s exports and a tenth of its
GDP.

The country’s largest agriculture, food, and chemistry company
Agrofert, linked to the ex-premier and populist presidential candidate
Andrej Babis, took over the Czech TOP HOP company. TOP HOP
produces one-quarter of the hops in a country with the largest per
capita beer consumption in the world, and supplies hops to some of the
largest breweries in Czechia including Pilsner Urquell or state-owned
Budweiser Budvar. The deal was reported to be worth up to CZK1bn
(€40mn).

3.2 Real economy - Estonia

3.2.1 Retail

Retail sales in the Baltics were uneven at the end of 2022 and were
likely to edge down in the first half of 2023 due to the expected
recession.

In Estonia, the year-over-year change in retail sales was also negative
at the end of 2022. Estonian retail trade fell by 4.0% y/y in October of
2022, following a 5.8% drop in the prior month.

47 CE Outlook 2023 www.intellinews.com