EBRD expects Polish economy to grow by 3.5 per cent in 2025

• EBRD upgrades its growth forecast for Poland to 3.5 per cent in 2025
• Upward revision of 0.2 percentage point reflects increased public investment and easing inflation
• Polish economy expected to grow by 3.4 per cent in 2026

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has revised up its gross domestic product (GDP) growth forecast for Poland to 3.5 per cent for 2025 from its previous forecast of 3.3 per cent in May.

The upgrade reflects a gradual recovery in public investment in the first half of 2025, easing inflation and higher wages. The Bank expects Poland’s economy to grow by 3.4 per cent in 2026.

The forecasts were published today in the EBRD’s Regional Economic Prospects report. It notes that Polish economic growth accelerated in the first six months of the year on the back of public investment, including energy transition projects, major transport schemes and defence-related procurement.

At the same time, the report notes that private investment remains volatile as firms delay projects amid global trade frictions and elevated borrowing costs. It highlights that growth is being weighed down by the import tariffs imposed by the United States of America, which are affecting the Polish economy indirectly by way of weaker demand from neighbouring Germany, Poland’s largest export partner.

Further increases in economic and trade policy uncertainty or a further escalation of geopolitical tensions would put growth at risk, as would an economic slowdown in Poland’s key trading partners.

Poland’s economic growth is expected to outpace that of the wider central Europe and the Baltic states region, for which the Bank forecasts growth to average 2.4 per cent in 2025 and 2.7 per cent in 2026. Resurgent inflation, higher taxes and high debt ratios are weighing on economic growth in the broader region, although robust private consumption and accelerating public investment ahead of the European Union’s Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) deadline are expected to counterbalance the risks to some extent.

The Bank expects average growth in the economies where it operates, excluding sub-Saharan Africa and Iraq, to moderate to 3.1 per cent in 2025, before picking up to 3.3 per cent in 2026. Including its new investee economies, the EBRD expects growth in its regions to average 3.2 per cent in 2025 and 3.3 per cent in 2026.

The EBRD is among the leading institutional investors in Poland. Since the start of its operations there in 1991, the Bank has invested more than €16 billion in 577 projects across the country.