The report claimed print and related trades would see the sixth-fastest decline in jobs, and the fastest decline among manufacturing sectors.

In the UK, two immediate factors are likely causing a decline in printers’ headcounts according to Brendan Perring, general manager of the IPIA: the industry’s continuing consolidation, and automation.

“I think in terms of declining jobs, it’s probably valid that print is in there. But that would be incorrect to assume that because it’s in the top six declining jobs, that it’s in the top six declining industries,” he told Printweek.

“The biggest printers are getting larger, and mid-level printers that were key employers are either selling up and being absorbed by larger trade printers or selling their books. On the smaller side of the scale, SME printers are increasingly moving to a hybrid model, where they are partially print managers and partially a production house.

“Previously you would have needed at least one operator for pretty much every press, every finishing line, just to make sure it was running correctly. 

“Now, because of the level of automation, some of our members that would have previously had 10 people working on a press room floor now need just two.”

Jakub Kuśmider, head of product for print software firm Printbox’s Masterpiece AI, told Printweek: “This shift isn’t about the disappearance of an industry.

“It’s about its evolution. The future of print is agile, creative, and smarter than ever.”

He added that the continual advance of printroom technology, including intelligent automation, would cause a shift from repetitive manual jobs to “strategic, high-value roles” which would make careers in print “more dynamic and rewarding”.

He added: “Fewer traditional jobs don’t signify a negative outcome. They reflect a pivot towards roles that demand higher expertise, creativity, and strategic thinking. AI liberates designers and print professionals from time-consuming tasks, empowering them to explore innovative ideas that fuse digital creativity with tangible print.”

“Some of the companies in the industry now have more people in software than they do in the press room,” noted Perring.

“It’s a wider transition of our industry from a majority of its staff being blue-collar, moving towards a much smaller group of white collar workers who are multidisciplinary and can do a lot of different things.”

On the ground in the UK, however, the picture of a shrinking workforce might be unfamiliar to some printers, according to Paul Manning, co-managing director at London mixed-discipline firm Rapidity.

“In the UK trade it feels, if anything, like we’re trying to employ more people. After Covid, most companies I’m talking to are struggling to find people,” he explained, speaking to Printweek.

Instead, Manning pointed out, the dramatic global decline in print jobs would likely come from the rapid pace of economic development outside of Western Europe and North America’s more mature print markets.

“At a global scale, taking into account China, Africa and India, then the figures make sense,” he said.

“10-15 years ago, we were looking at whether it would be possible to open a printers in Dubai, and we never even got to second base: we found they were happy to run very old technology, with very cheap labour. You couldn’t compete out there, because cheap labour was so reliable.

“But now what you’re finding with China, and many other countries, is that their wages are coming up as their economies mature. So now – to generalise – some of these companies will have to find a way to reduce their staffing levels, when they have never had to before because of plentiful cheap labour.

“We’re not a country with plentiful cheap labour, so we’ve had to embrace technology a bit quicker to get our overheads down. Now, you’ve got the world’s biggest nation looking to automate [processes], so the result is no surprise in that respect.”

One issue with the WEF’s statistics, Manning pointed out, is that it gathers all print sectors under a single umbrella at a time when many of the industry’s verticals are growing – or shrinking – at completely different rates.

“We tend to get tarred with the same brush, regardless of what sector of the industry we’re in. When they talk about [a 20% reduction over five years] it’s anything from newspaper printing to packaging, to marketing, to mail, to display – it’s just too general,” he said. 

“We’re a small business, but we see display printing growing massively, and we’re looking for people all the time. But we know that general volumes of print are probably still declining.”

Smithers' latest industry report, published in late January, forecast that packaging and labels would be the industry's sole vertical to enjoy global growth (3.6%) over the next four years, set against a decline in publication work and a standstill in the graphics sector.

In Perring's view, most of the UK print market's likely decline has already taken hold, especially in the major drop-off in news and publication print.

“Those volumes have been lost. But if you look at areas like direct mail, signs and graphics, outdoor print, those sectors are growing.

“But," he concluded, “even though they’re growing, that doesn’t necessarily mean they are going to be significantly increasing their headcount.”