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Unemployment in the EU regions: from 2.5% to 34.0%

Apr 29, 2016 | News

(28 April 2016) – More than 60% of the NUTS 2 regions of the European Union recorded a decrease of at least 0.5% in their regional unemployment rate in 2015 compared with 2014.

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© Gareth Williams

However, regional unemployment rates continued to vary widely across the EU regions, with the lowest rates recorded in the German regions of Freiburg and Lower-Bavaria (both 2.5%), Upper-Bavaria and Upper-Palatinate (both 2.7%), followed by Prague in the Czech Republic (2.8%).

At the opposite end of the scale, the highest unemployment rates were registered in Melilla (34.0%) and Andalusia (31.5%) in Spain, Central Macedonia (30.7%) in Greece, the Canary islands and Extremadura (both 29.1%) in Spain.

Among the 274 EU regions for which data are available, 60 had an unemployment rate of 4.7% or less in 2015, half the average of the EU (9.4%). They included twenty-four regions in Germany, twenty-one in the United Kingdom, five in Austria, three in the Czech Republic, two each in Belgium, Hungary and Romania and one in Italy.

In contrast, 29 regions had a rate of at least 18.8%, double that of the EU: eleven regions in Greece, ten in Spain and four each in France (all overseas departments) and Italy.

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