European Union statistics

Statistics in the European Union are collected by Eurostat (European statistics body).

Area and population

EU and UK population cartogram

As of 1 January 2006, the population of the EU was about 493 million people, although in 2020 the EU lost over 10% of its population as a result of the UK leaving the bloc. Many countries are expected to experience a decline in population over the coming decades, though this could be offset with new countries planning to join the EU within the next 20 years. The most populous member state is Germany, with an estimated 80.4 million people. France and Ireland have the highest birth-rates. The most densely populated country is the island of Malta, which is also the smallest, while the largest in area is France. The least densely populated country is Finland.

Population figures in the table below are from 2006 or 2007 estimates. The highest and lowest figures in each column have been marked in bold.

Member State	Population in millions	Population  % of EU	Area km2	Area % of EU	Pop. density People/km2
European Union	494.8	100%	4,422,773	100%	112
Austria	8.3	1.7%	83,858	1.9%	99
Belgium	10.5	2.1%	30,510	0.7%	344
Bulgaria	7.7	1.6%	110,912	2.5%	70
Croatia	4.3	0.9%	56,594	1.3%	75.8
Cyprus	0.8	0.2%	9,250	0.2%	84
Czech Republic	10.3	2.1%	78,866	1.8%	131
Denmark	5.4	1.1%	43,094	1.0%	126
Estonia	1.3	0.3%	45,226	1.0%	29
Finland	5.3	1.1%	337,030	7.6%	16
France	65.03	13.%	643,548	14.6%	111
Germany	80.4	16.6%	357,021	8.1%	225
Greece	11.1	2.2%	131,940	3.0%	84
Hungary	10.1	2.0%	93,030	2.1%	108
Ireland	4.6	0.9%	70,280	1.6%	60
Italy	58.8	11.9%	301,320	6.8%	195
Latvia	2.3	0.5%	64,589	1.5%	35
Lithuania	3.4	0.7%	65,200	1.5%	45
Luxembourg	0.5	0.1%	2,586	0.1%	181
Malta	0.5	0.1%	316	0.0007%	1,261
Netherlands	17	3.3%	41,526	0.9%	394
Poland	38.1	7.7%	312,685	7.1%	122
Portugal	10.6	2.1%	92,931	2.1%	114
Romania	21.6	4.4%	238,391	5.4%	91
Spain	44.7	9.0%	504,782	11.4%	87
Slovakia	5.4	1.1%	48,845	1.1%	111
Slovenia	2.0	0.4%	20,253	0.5%	99
Sweden	10	1.8%	449,964	10.2%	20

Economy

For statistics relating to economy, please see Economy of the European Union.

EU budget

The primary resource for funding the European Union is the contributions sought from member states. Each member state contributes to the EU budget, and receives funding back from the EU, depending on the relative wealth of the states, i.e. their ability to pay.

The table below shows the contributions as a percentage of the total budget. This takes into account the special considerations given to the United Kingdom to reduce its contribution through a rebate. Expenditure in Luxembourg, Belgium and France include items for the EU administrative centres in each of those countries.

Member State	Total contribution in Euro	Total contribution as % of total EU budget	Total expenditure year 2006 in Euro	Total expenditure as % of total EU budget	Net contribution in Euro	Net contribution in Euro per capita	Total contribution in Euro per capita
European Union	105,259,468,772	100.00%	106,575,500,000	100.00%	-1,316,031,228	-3	213
Germany	22,218,438,941	21.11%	12,242,400,000	11.49%	9,976,038,941	124	276
France	17,303,107,859	16.44%	13,496,200,000	12.66%	3,806,907,859	59	266
Italy	14,359,479,157	13.64%	10,922,300,000	10.25%	3,437,179,157	58	244
United Kingdom	13,739,900,046	13.05%	8,294,200,000	7.78%	5,445,700,046	90	226
Spain	8,957,286,488	8.51%	12,883,000,000	12.09%	-3,925,713,512	-88	200
Netherlands	5,552,933,781	5.28%	2,190,400,000	2.06%	3,362,533,781	198	327
Belgium	4,035,286,807	3.83%	5,625,100,000	5.28%	-1,589,813,193	-151	384
Sweden	2,832,862,800	2.69%	1,573,400,000	1.48%	1,259,462,800	126	283
Austria	2,308,432,030	2.19%	1,830,100,000	1.72%	478,332,030	58	278
Denmark	2,130,860,212	2.02%	1,501,900,000	1.41%	628,960,212	116	395
Poland	2,099,087,114	1.99%	5,305,600,000	4.98%	-3,206,512,886	-84	55
Greece	1,882,611,879	1.79%	6,833,700,000	6.41%	-4,951,088,121	-446	170
Finland	1,544,832,284	1.47%	1,280,400,000	1.20%	264,432,284	50	291
Portugal	1,443,049,602	1.37%	3,634,800,000	3.41%	-2,191,750,398	-207	136
Ireland	1,341,281,313	1.27%	2,461,800,000	2.31%	-1,120,518,687	-244	292
Hungary	1,003,119,411	0.95%	1,842,200,000	1.73%	-839,080,589	-83	99
Czech Republic	932,392,859	0.89%	1,330,000,000	1.25%	-397,607,141	-39	91
Slovakia	393,148,777	0.37%	696,200,000	0.65%	-303,051,223	-56	73
Slovenia	299,993,572	0.29%	406,000,000	0.38%	-106,006,428	-53	150
Luxembourg	241,439,011	0.23%	1,194,800,000	1.12%	-953,360,989	-1,907	483
Lithuania	221,997,405	0.21%	799,800,000	0.75%	-577,802,595	-170	65
Cyprus	144,556,416	0.14%	239,600,000	0.22%	-95,043,584	-119	181
Latvia	115,205,431	0.11%	402,600,000	0.24%	-287,394,569	-125	50
Estonia	100,756,308	0.10%	300,000,000	0.28%	-199,243,692	-142	72
Malta	57,409,269	0.05%	157,000,000	0.14%	-99,590,731	-249	144
Bulgaria			360,600,000	0.34%	-360,600,000	-47
Romania			693,100,000	0.65%	-693,100,000	-32

Economic and governance-related rankings

There are many indices available on issues such as corruption, development, and freedom. The rankings below include all EU member states, EU candidates (with the exception of Turkey, cause their accession negotiations have stalled since 2016) and EFTA countries.

Freedom of the press

EU Rank Member State Global Rank 1 Norway 1 2 Finland 2 3 Denmark 3 4 Sweden 5 5 Netherlands 6 6 Switzerland 8 7 Portugal 10 8 Germany 11 9 Belgium 12 10 Ireland 13 11 Estonia 14 12 Iceland 15 13 Luxembourg 17 14 Austria 18 15 Latvia 22 16 Cyprus 27 17 Lithuania 28

EU Rank Member State Global Rank 18 Spain 29 19 Slovenia 32 20 Slovakia 33 21 France 34 22 Czech Republic 40 23 Italy 41 24 Romania 48 25 Croatia 59 26 Poland 62 27 Greece 65 28 Malta 81 29 Albania 85 30 Hungary 89 31 North Macedonia 92 32 Serbia 93 33 Montenegro 105 34 Bulgaria 111

Reporters sans frontières (Reporters Without Borders) conducts an annual survey on the freedom of the press and produces scores (not shown here) for each country, resulting in the Press Freedom Index. In 2019 and 2020, Finland was proclaimed as having the freest press in the European Union, and the second in the world behind Norway. Bulgaria was ranked as having the least free press in the European Union in 2019 and 2020.

Colour Codes
Good Situation
Satisfactory Situation
Noticeable problems
Difficult situation

Economic freedom

EU Rank Member State Global Rank 1 Switzerland 5 2 Ireland 6 3 Denmark 8 4 Estonia 10 5 Iceland 13 6 Netherlands 14 7 Lithuania 16 8 Luxembourg 19 9 Finland 20 10 Sweden 22 11 Czech Republic 23 12 Germany 27 13 Norway 28 14 Austria 29 15 Latvia 32 16 Bulgaria 36 17 Cyprus 37

EU Rank Member State Global Rank 18 Romania 38 19 North Macedonia 41 20 Malta 42 21 Poland 46 22 Belgium 48 23 Slovenia 52 24 Portugal 56 25 Albania 57 26 Spain 58 27 Slovakia 60 28 Hungary 62 29 France 64 30 Serbia 65 31 Italy 74 32 Croatia 84 33 Montenegro 91 34 Greece 100

An index of Economic Freedom is produced by The Wall Street Journal and the Heritage Foundation. It uses 50 different variables to compile the survey, in areas such as trade policy and government intervention.

A similar index produced by the World Economic Forum is its Global Competitiveness Index.

Source: 2020 Index of Economic Freedom.

Colour Codes
Free
Mostly Free
Moderately Free
Moderately Unfree

Perception of corruption

Global Rank Country Score 1 Denmark 90 2 Finland 87 4 Norway 84 5 Sweden 83 7 Switzerland 82 8 Netherlands 80 9 Germany 79 10 Luxembourg 77 10 Ireland 77 14 Estonia 74 14 Iceland 74 18 Belgium 73 18 United Kingdom 73 21 France 72 22 Austria 71 33 Lithuania 62 33 Portugal 62 35 Spain 60 39 Latvia 59 41 Italy 56 41 Slovenia 56 41 Czech Republic 56

Global Rank Country Score 41 Georgia 56 45 Poland 55 49 Slovakia 53 51 Greece 52 51 Cyprus 52 54 Malta 51 57 Croatia 50 63 Romania 46 63 Armenia 46 65 Montenegro 45 72 Bulgaria 43 77 Hungary 42 84 Kosovo 41 85 North Macedonia 40 91 Moldova 39 91 Belarus 39 101 Serbia 36 101 Albania 36 101 Turkey 36 110 Bosnia and Herzegovina 34 116 Ukraine 33 137 Russia 28

Transparency International is an international NGO publishing an annual Global Corruption Report indicating the perception of corruption around the world. The rankings of the table refer to the Corruption Perceptions Index 2022 [1]. A high ranking means low corruption.

Human development

Rank Country Global Rank 1 Norway 1 2 Ireland 2 3 Switzerland 2 4 Iceland 4 5 Germany 6 6 Sweden 7 7 Netherlands 8 8 Denmark 10 9 Finland 11 10 United Kingdom 13 11 Belgium 14 12 Austria 18 13 Slovenia 22 14 Luxembourg 23 15 Spain 25 16 France 26 17 Czech Republic 27 18 Malta 28 19 Estonia 29 20 Italy 29 21 Greece 32 22 Cyprus 33

Rank Country Global Rank 23 Lithuania 34 24 Poland 35 25 Latvia 37 26 Portugal 38 27 Slovakia 39 28 Hungary 40 29 Croatia 43 30 Montenegro 48 31 Romania 49 32 Russia 52 33 Belarus 53 34 Turkey 54 35 Bulgaria 56 36 Georgia 61 37 Serbia 64 38 Albania 69 39 Bosnia and Herzegovina 73 40 Ukraine 74 41 Armenia 81 42 North Macedonia 82 43 Azerbaijan 88 44 Moldova 90

Colour Codes
Very High Human Development
High Human Development

The Human Development Index is a measure produced by the United Nations which covers three aspects of human development:

• poverty (GDP per capita)
• education (mean years of schooling and expected years of schooling)
• health (life expectancy)

The rankings of the table refer to the UNDP Human Development Report 2019 (2018 data). The UN lists all EU member states as countries with very high human development.

Democracy Index

Global Rank Country Score 1 Norway 9.81 3 Iceland 9.52 4 Sweden 9.39 5 Finland 9.29 6 Denmark 9.28 7 Switzerland 9.14 8 Ireland 9.13 9 Netherlands 9.00 10 Luxembourg 8.81 13 Germany 8.80 14 United Kingdom 8.28 20 Austria 8.20 22 France 8.07 22 Spain 8.07 25 Greece 7.97 25 Czech Republic 7.97 27 Estonia 7.96 28 Portugal 7.95 31 Slovenia 7.75 33 Malta 7.70 34 Italy 7.69 36 Belgium 7.64

Global Rank Country Score 37 Cyprus 7.38 38 Latvia 7.37 39 Lithuania 7.36 43 Slovakia 7.07 46 Poland 7.04 56 Hungary 6.64 57 Bulgaria 6.53 59 Croatia 6.50 61 Romania 6.45 61 Montenegro 6.45 64 Albania 6.41 68 Serbia 6.33 69 Moldova 6.23 72 North Macedonia 6.10 82 Armenia 5.63 87 Ukraine 5.42 90 Georgia 5.20 97 Bosnia and Herzegovina 5.00 103 Turkey 4.35 134 Azerbaijan 2.87 146 Russia 2.28 153 Belarus 1.99

The Democracy Index is an index compiled by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), the research division of the Economist Group, a UK-based private company which publishes the weekly newspaper The Economist.

See also

• Enlargement of the European Union
• Largest cities of the European Union by population within city limits
• Hispanics and Latins in Europe
• List of European Union member states by population
• Largest urban areas of the European Union and Larger Urban Zones
• Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe statistics

External links

• Eurostat – Statistics Explained
• Health-EU Portal Health Statistics
• EU Budget Data