The Francophone business daily ‘L’Echo’ reports that the British pharmaceutical company GSK cut 400 jobs in Belgium in 2025. GSK employs more than 8,500 at three sites in Wallonia. The job cuts were achieved by not renewing temporary contracts and not replacing staff that had left the company voluntarily.
At the end of November 2025, GSK that has sites at Wavre, Rixensart (both Walloon Brabant) and Gembloux (Namur Province) said that it had 8,544 staff in Belgium. This is 411 fewer than a year earlier and the lowest number since 2016. During 2025 only the loss of 50 jobs at GSK’s site in Gembloux was publicly reported.
To implement the downsizing and avoid having to apply the so-called "Renault law" on collective redundancies, GSK Belgium has applied voluntary redundancy programmes. The most recent of these was accepted by around 70 people.
The company has also adjusted its recruitment policy. Currently very few permanent contracts are being offered to new employees. On the company’s website there are 543 situations vacant, 40 of which are at its Wavre site. The lion’s share of the vacancies are internships and replacement or temporary contracts.
Meanwhile, activities GSK’s Rixensart site are declining with the production of malaria and hepatitis B vaccines being discontinued.
The company denies that reduced investment in the Belgian sites is the reason for the reduction in its workforce. In a statement GSK said that “Our site in Wavre is the largest vaccine production site in the world and benefits from an annual investment of around 300 million euro to modernise it and integrate advanced technologies”.
Europe’s status as a leader in the sector is under threat, as the US is becoming an increasingly popular as a base for vaccine production. In September, GSK announced its intent to invest 30 billion US dollars in the United State, most notably in the construction of a production site in Pennsylvania.
Pharmaceutical products from the EU are currently subject to 15% import duty in the US.