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Key facts

  • North East England is home to 2.5m people and has a £38.8bn economy
  • Companies in North East England are consistently the most optimistic about the general business situation*
  • The region enjoys strong domestic orders and achieves consistent growth in output*
  • North East employment growth is greater than in any other region*
  • 35% of the UK’s Pharmaceutical GDP made in the North East England
  • 58% of the UK’s Petrochemicals made in the North East England
  • 40,000 direct workers in Pharmaceuticals, Petrochemicals, Speciality & Fine Chemicals, Polymers and bioprocessing in North East England
  • 280,000 working in the supply chains of these sectors
  • Each job in the Process Industry creates £85,000 of GVA for the region compared to the average inhabitant £14,000
  • Over 500 companies in this industry are present in the region including supply chain companies
  • The Process Industry is over 30% of the whole North East England regional industrial economy
  • This industry is investing a further £4 billion in the North East England by 2015
  • Demographics - requires 8000 new people to come in to the industry by 2015
  • Proposed Investment also needs 8000 new people to enter the industry by 2015
  • North East England is home to the National Skills Academy for the Process Industry
  • North East England is home to the Centre of Innovation for the Process Industry – identified as the UKs best in innovation practice
  • North East England is home to the National Industrial Bioprocessing Facility
  • North East England home to the UK’s first wood fired power station
  • North East England home to the UK’s first operational ship to shore LNG facility
  • North East England has five Universities with 5 star technical departments supporting this sector
  • In Commodity & Petrochemicals infrastructure is key, this region has:
     - Power stations, Water treatment, road infrastructure, site utilities dedicated to the process industry
     - Teesport is the second largest port in Britain which is 70% occupied by the process sector
  • North East England is establishing a reputation as a national centre of excellence in life sciences and healthcare is a pillar of the economy, comprising more than 6,000 related organisations with an annual turnover of £5bn
  • North East England is the UK’s most important centre for Biofuels, with Europe’s biggest Bioethanol facility and the UKs biggest biodiesel unit
  • NEPIC and NEB link the whole transport Biofuels supply chain – farmers to petrol pump
  • NEPIC the industry support organization is recognized as amongst the best cluster groups (French Government Study)
  • North East England is the only place in England with a rising favorability for the chemicals industry (Mori Poll 2008)
  • NEPIC teachers win national awards for NEPIC’s Primary and Secondary school programmes
  • NEPIC educational programmes reach 450 schools and up to 20,000 school children
  • NEPIC School Awards £12k per year to 6 schools cement industrial educational programmes 
  • NEPIC has helped create over £150m GVA for the region and approaching 2000 jobs
  • NEPIC is establishing a Process Industry MBA in conjunction with Durham University
  • NEPIC has international cluster agreements/arrangements with clusters in France, India, Brazil, Holland, Germany and across the UK
  • NEPIC supports its member companies with 6 strategic issues including winning new business
  • Companies regularly secure new business from advertising through NEPIC
  • Special support services are given to SME’s
  • NEPIC is the preferred route to secure support for process industry investments
  • NEPIC networking over 20 events per year with over 2000 attendees 
  • Industry inputs £2.5m to NEPIC activity
  • NEPIC attends over 25 careers events each year promoting the sector
  • More than 120 industrial leaders have input to NEPIC programmes
  • NEPIC is a not for profit limited company so all its earnings are channeled into industry activity
  • NEPIC secures funding for over 25 Productivity & Efficiency programmes in companies valued at £20m
  • The chemical process industry is now Britain’s only net manufacturing export sector, with sales approaching £70 billion and exports of £37.3 billion
  • The UK's National Skills Academy for Process Industries (NSAPI) has been established in North East England, confirming the region as a world-leading centre for the process and chemicals sector 
  • The Centre for Process Innovation (CPI), based in the Tees Valley, has been recognised by the UK Government as an example of best practice for its approach to market-led innovation.  This approach champions the commercialisation of new products and technologies ready for the market place 
  • The companies in this industry create £9 billion of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) 
  • Tees Valley is home to the UK’s largest petrochemical complex and has Europe’s biggest hydrogen network.  It also has key pipeline infrastructure with BOC, receiving a £100m investment over the last three years - and the largest UK chemical handling port, at Teesport 
  • Wilton International in Tees Valley, is an integrated site and one of the few in Western Europe with special development status, enabling it to be used for heavy industrial purposes such as chemical processing.  A global player, its primary market is Europe, exporting its products via the deep sea port at the mouth of the river Tees. 
  • By 2010, a third of the UK’s ethanol production will be based here. It also hosts the UK’s first large-scale wood biomass facility developed by SembCorp Utilities UK
  • The spirit of innovation with which North East England is synonymous, is infectious. Here people approach life with passion and look to the future with optimism

*Figures from the Experian six-monthly Regional Survey of UK Economic Trends 2007.