For some sectors such as iron and steel, material costs can be more than twice the cost of labour and energy in the EU.

Omissions

• The specific cost breakdown for iron and steel comes from a European Commission JRC study using data from October 2019, published in 2020; no 2024/2025/2026 official update of this production-cost breakdown for the steel sector was found before the session date.
• The claim is presented without a reference year, while the supporting evidence is more than two years old relative to the 2026 plenary statement.
• The claim correctly hedges ('some sectors'), but the ratio is not uniform: in less material-intensive manufacturing branches personnel costs can reach 25-30% of total expenditure, so 'more than twice' applies to material-intensive sectors (basic metals, non-metallic minerals, chemicals) rather than to EU industry as a whole.
• Eurostat structural business statistics report 'purchases of goods and services' (which bundle materials and energy together) against personnel costs, so the precise materials-versus-labour-and-energy split requires the JRC production-cost study rather than SBS aggregates.

Sources

• PrimaryEuropean Commission Joint Research Centre — Production costs of the iron and steel industry (JRC121276)"The results show that the EU27 has the third highest production costs for hot rolled coil via the integrated route (458 EUR/t). The main contributors to these costs are the raw material costs 65%, the 'other costs' 27% and energy costs 17%." ... "The materials cost in the EU27 are 68% and 58% of the production costs, for each of the two respective production routes." (data as of October 2019)
• PrimaryEurostat — Metals and metal products (Statistics in Focus / statistical book, cost structure of the metals sector)"Purchases of goods & services (EUR million) 7 808 ... Personnel costs (EUR million) 399" for the first processing of ferrous metals group, and "As a proportion of total expenditure, however, personnel costs in the sector accounted for a relatively high share (23.9 %)" for structural metal products — illustrating that in basic metals/intermediate steel making purchases of goods and services dwarf personnel costs.
• PrimaryEurostat — Structural business statistics overview (Statistics Explained)"about 2.2 million manufacturing enterprises in the EU generated approximately €2 470 billion of value added in 2023, while providing employment to 30.3 million persons" — used to confirm the most recent SBS reference year available (2023) and that SBS publishes cost aggregates but not a materials-versus-labour-and-energy split for basic metals.