ABSTRACT
Furnitura Ltd 1 was established in 2004, in Latvia – a country located in Northern Europe on the coastline of the Baltic Sea. Extending over an area of 64,589 sq km, and bordered by Estonia, Lithuania, Russia and Belarus, Latvia has approximately 2 million inhabitants. The country is dominated by the service sector (approximately 70 per cent of 2010 GDP), whereas manufacturing comprises only approximately 10 per cent of 2010 GDP. 2 After joining the European Union and NATO in 2004, Latvia experienced the fastest growth rates in the European Union, reaching GDP growth of +12.2 per cent in 2006. 3 This was, however, followed by a sharp slowdown, starting in early 2008 – a consequence of the world financial crisis, with Latvia’s GDP falling to approximately –18 per cent in 2009. 4
