Cumulative Costs Assessment (CCA) of the EU Ceramics and Glass Industries

A Cumulative Cost Assessment (CCA) aims to identify, assess and, where possible, quantify the cumulative cost generated by selected areas of EU legislation on a given industrial sector. It is retrospective and strictly centred on EU rules. The CCA is all about regulatory costs. Hence, it does not include the benefit side of rules, nor does it assess the cost-benefit balance of the legislation.
Against this background, the CCA of the EU ceramics and glass industries has measured regulatory costs incurred by EU manufacturers of ceramics (bricks and tiles, ceramic tiles, fired refractories and unfired shaped) and glass (refractories, packaging glass, glass tableware and flat glass) and linked to EU legislation in the following areas: i) Internal Market; ii) energy; iii) climate; iv) environment; v) workers’ and workplace safety; and vi) consumers and health legislation. The CCA also compared regulatory costs with production costs and margins registered by ceramics manufacturers, thus revealing the impact of regulation on competitiveness. Regulatory costs, production costs and margins have been assessed over the period 2006-15.
The study relies on primary data collected via semi-structure interviews with 100 ceramics and glass plants across all EU Member States. Data have been analysed by applying the standard cost model and regulatory cost model. Regulatory costs represent between 2% to 5% of production costs in the sectors under investigation; by contrast, they constitute a much more prominent share of margins, especially in years of crisis.