NUTS amendments Torbioern.Carlquist@ec.europa.eu

Structure of my talk The rules of the NUTS Regulation The changes of NUTS in 2006 Detailed overview of changes Enlargement with BG, RO Regions in other European countries

Chapter 1 The rules

Basic rules for NUTS EU Regulation from 2003 3 hierarchical levels (NUTS levels 1 - 3) Criteria: population thresholds Administrative regions – average size within country Non-administrative regions – size of individual region must comply

Population thresholds Level Minimum Maximum NUTS 1 3 million 7 million NUTS 2 800 000 NUTS 3 150 000

Manage the changes of NUTS NUTS regions are frozen in order to keep stable statistical time series Possibility to review NUTS regions every 3 years First general review took place in 2006 In case of change, statistical data are re-calculated by Member States

Chapter 2 The changes

Overview of the 2006 changes 12 EU-25 countries concerned by NUTS modifications Territorial changes (112 new regions) Name changes (10 regions) Name corrections (12 regions) Biggest change is in Denmark NUTS 1 changed only in SE NUTS 2 changed only in DK, DE, SI, UK All other territorial changes are at NUTS level 3

The new NUTS in figures (EU-25) Level Closed codes New codes NUTS 1 1 3 NUTS 2 7 (+ 8) 10 (+ 8) NUTS 3 80 (+ 36) 99 (+ 36) (Brackets: number of changed codes due to territorial changes at next higher NUTS level)

Number of NUTS regions (EU-25) Level NUTS 2003 NUTS 2006 NUTS 1 89 91 NUTS 2 254 257 NUTS 3 1214 1233

Chapter 3 Detailed overview

Next steps Publication of legal text in Official Journal OJ L39 of 10.02.2007, page 1 Eurostat’s RAMON server will be updated Eurostat PDF publication with maps (2007) Implementation of new NUTS from 1 Jan 2008

Chapter 4 Bulgaria, Romania

Latest enlargement Bulgaria and Romania 1 January 2007 Amending annexes I, II, III of the NUTS Regulation through co-decision procedure during 2007 This amendment to be done separately from the NUTS 2006 revision Statistical data can already be transmitted with new codes from BG, RO

Modify regions in BG, RO BG – modify NUTS 1 and NUTS 2 RO – introduce NUTS 1 RO – change some labels of NUTS 2

BG, RO: number of regions Level Bulgaria Romania NUTS 1 2 (non-adm.) 4 (non-adm.) NUTS 2 6 (non-adm.) 8 (non-adm.) NUTS 3 28 (adm.) 42 (adm.)

Chapter 5 Other countries

Statistical regions (CCs) Turkey – agreed on 3 levels in 2002 Croatia – new agreement on level 2 regions 2007 The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia – need agreement on level 3 regions CARDS countries – Eurostat is open to first discussions on Statistical Regions, but there is no urgency All proposals will be checked against rules in NUTS Regulation

Statistical regions (EFTA) Iceland – new agreement on splitting the country into two statistical regions at level 3 from 1 Jan 2008 Liechtenstein – no change Norway – no change Switzerland – no change

Thanks for listening ! Any Questions ?