The chart above shows the Purchasing Power Parity Gross Domestic Product (GDP PPP) of EU regions per square kilometer of territory in euros. The Western EU has such a high GDP per area that it is more than double the remaining regions' combined GDP per area.
Findings
- The difference between the largest GDP PPP per area region, the Western EU, and the smallest, the Eastern EU, is €5,890,743.
- The Western EU's GDP PPP per area, is 6.63 times larger than the Eastern EU's.
- The Southern EU which has the second largest GDP per area, only has less half (44.14%) the GDP per area of the Western EU.
- The Northern EU has a GDP per area that is just under two-fifths (37.65%) of the Southern EU, and the Eastern EU has one that is just over four-fifths (90.71%) the Northern EU's.
Caveats
- Area data is from 2007.
- GDP data is from 2016.
- The area includes both land and water area.
- The Western EU consists of Germany, United Kingdom, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Ireland, and Luxembourg.
- The Southern EU consists of Italy, Spain, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus, and Malta.
- The Northern EU consists of Sweden, Denmark, and Finland.
- The Eastern EU consists of Poland, Czech Republic, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Croatia, Slovenia, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.
Details
Seeing as the Western EU has five of the top six states in this metric as well as eight of the top 11, it is no surprise the it would fare so well as a region. Even though Malta is the top ranked state, its small size does not contribute much to bringing up the region as a whole.
The geographies of the four main EU regions are relatively similar but the Western EU has so many people producing wealth that the other regions just cannot compete in this metric.
Sources
Eurostat. 2017. "Gross Domestic Product at Market Prices. Accessed October 26, 2017. http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/tgm/refreshTableAction.do?tab=table&plugin=1&pcode=tec00001&language=en.
United Nations. 2007. "United Nations Statistics Division - Environment Statistics." Accessed January 23, 2018. https://unstats.un.org/unsd/environment/totalarea.htm.