The European Centre for the Development of Vocational Training has produced a report on Europe's future skills needs, which expected services industries to continue to rise at the expense of traditional manufacturing sectors, such as printing.

The 'Rest of Manufacturing' category, which includes printing, employed 22.6m people in the 25 EU member states in 2006. This was down 0.9% from 1996, but decline in the next decade is forecast to slow, with employment dropping just 0.2% by 2015.

Overall, the manufacturing sector is expected to lose half a million jobs across Europe between 2006 and 2015, though it won't be hit as hard as the primary sector, which will lose well over two million jobs, especially in agriculture.

The report noted that the trend is likely to be more marked in the new EU member states, which are yet to undergo the structural economic changes of the older member states.

"Although many newer members of the EU still rely to a much greater extent on agriculture and manufacturing for employment, there are clear signs that this is changing rapidly," the report said.

The UK is expected to be a net beneficiary of jobs growth, the report says.

The UK had 30.6m jobs overall in 2006, predicted to rise 4.1% by 2010 and a further 4.3% between 2010 and 2015. That averages at an annual growth rate of 1% between 2006 and 2010 and 0.9% between 2010 and 2015.

However, the report did not break down the country figures by industry sector.