Taylor Scott International News
Eurostat data | Friday 25 October 2013 Artificial areas, such as buildings, roads and rail networks, covered only 5% of the total surface area of the EU in 2012. Forests and other wooded land occupied around 40%, farmland one fourth and grassland one fifth. These figures, published by Eurostat on 25 October, are the findings of a large-scale land survey, the ‘Land use/cover area frame survey’ (LUCAS), conducted most recently in 2012. LUCAS is the largest harmonised land survey ever implemented in the EU. Photographs can be found in the statistical atlas on the Eurostat site (1). More than half of Sweden (76% of total land area), Finland (72%), Estonia (61%), Slovenia (60%) and Latvia (56%) is covered by forests. The highest shares of cropland are observed in Denmark (49%), Hungary (47%), Romania (36%), the Czech Republic and Poland (both 34%), Germany (33%), Bulgaria and Italy (both 32%) and France (31%). More than two thirds (67%) of Ireland is covered by natural or agricultural grasslands, followed by the United Kingdom (40%), the Netherlands (38%), Luxembourg (37%) and Belgium (32% Finland (16%), Sweden (12%) and the Netherlands (11%) have the largest proportions of water areas. A third of Malta is covered with built-up and other artificial areas, followed by Belgium (13%), Luxembourg and the Netherlands (both 12%). Taylor Scott International
Taylor Scott International, Taylor Scott
