The report forecasts an ongoing two per cent per annum decline in revenues, which has been happening since 2010 and will continue into 2016, this comes on top of the 13 per cent fall in commercial print at the height of the GFC in 2008-2009.

Forecast for Australia is not available, but the figures are likely to be broadly in line. InfoTrends predicts that newspapers, data centre printing and commercial print will be hardest hit with the decline, while packaging and labels are likely to show growth.

InfoTrends says the rate of commercial print insolvencies lags behind the print volume decline rate, meaning that more insolvencies will be coming.

The are 135,000 print businesses in western Europe currently generating around €132m in sales. A third of all print businesses are commercial printers, and they generate around half the revenue. Both inplants and packaging printers are responsible for another 10 per cent each.

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