1. Working Group on regional, urban and rural development statistics
Item 5.4 Local administrative units

2. Local administrative units ("LAUs"):
Complement the NUTS classification as further hierarchical level(s) of detail;
Subdivide the NUTS 3 level;
Should have at least one administrative level;
Shall be transmitted by the Member States to Eurostat within the first six months of every year;
Are decided by the Member States;
Are matched with geographical information by Eurostat and EuroGeographics; forming a base for the production of LAU and NUTS maps;
Are published annually by Eurostat.

3. State of play The LAU lists up to and including 2014 are published:
LAU lists 2014 have been matched with geographical information (EuroBoundaryMap 9.2)
LAU lists "2015" with reference date have been sent by the Member States and received by Eurostat;
Matching with geographical information has started;
Lists and maps will be available later this year / early 2016.

4. Room for simplification?
The NUTS Regulation does not determine how many levels of LAU have to exist
Having two levels, of which only one need to be administrative leads to numerous issues:
Geographical and / or administrative inconsistencies between LAU levels and / or between one or two LAU levels and the NUTS 3 level
Especially non-administrative LAU levels are subject to frequent amendments, or don't actually exist anymore since long
Concerns about which LAU level to use to calculate the typologies (DEGURBA, FUA, coastal)
Is one level of LAU maybe enough??
(provided that it is administrative, sums up to NUTS 3 and chosen by the Member States)

5. Spatial matching of LAU lists problematic
LAU lists decided by Member States but not necessarily coordinated with geospatial authorities;
„The matching of LAUs to NUTS and geographical information is only clear for 13 Member States.”;
Some of the issues:
LAU 1 or 2 level sometimes obsolete (not in use anymore in M/S for years), and/or their geodata not available;
Inconsistencies or identity between LAU 1 and NUTS 3;
Mix of administrative levels between rural and urban areas, and between LAU 1 and 2 level;
One of the LAU levels does not cover the whole territory of the country in a few Member States;
Many LAU levels contain only non-administrative units, which are often not stable and have limited use for statistics;
LAU2 not fully nested in LAU1.

6. How can we achieve a better matching of LAU lists and geodata?
How can we coordinate better between the LAU list owners and the providers of geospatial information at national level?
How can we achieve a full hierarchical and integrated system of statistical output areas and administrative areas for all EU Member States?
<UN-GGIM: Europe> a good mechanism to achieve this?
-> Under UN-GGIM: Eurostat works towards a EU statistical-spatial framework with consistent statistical geographies.