City statistics – introduction

Planned article update: March 2024

Highlights

The main objectives of this “Methodological Manual of City Statistics” are to provide the data suppliers with the necessary information to achieve coherence and comparability of the collected data and to help users understand and interpret the meaning of the data for their own purposes. This Methodological Manual on City Statistics is an update of the former “Urban Audit – Methodological Handbook” and should be seen as a document that will develop over time according to new requirements on city statistics.

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Policy background

There is a continuously growing demand for an assessment of the quality of life in European cities, where a significant proportion of European Union citizens live. The City Statistics data collection is a joint effort by the Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO), the National Statistical Institutes and Eurostat to provide reliable and comparable information on cities and functional urban areas in Member States of the European Union, in Candidate Countries, in Switzerland and in Norway. Eurostat publishes EU statistics at a city and functional urban area level for many statistical domains: these statistics are widely used in the context of various EU policies with spatial dimensions.

Sustainable development goals (SDGs)

Sustainable development may be defined as economic growth and social progress that meets the needs of present generations without jeopardising future generations. It provides a comprehensive approach bringing together economic, social and environmental considerations in ways that mutually reinforce each other.

The United Nation's (UN’s) 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted by world leaders in 2015, represents a global sustainable development framework based around 17 Sustainable Development Goals and 169 specific targets. It is a commitment to eradicate poverty and achieve sustainable development by 2030 worldwide, ensuring that no one is left behind.

European policymakers recognise that coherent and integrated regional policy should form an essential part of the EU’s implementation strategy for the 2030 Agenda, whereby SDG indicators have to capture problems at a scale where they occur (the regional, sub-regional and city-level). The urban dimension is at the heart of SDG 11, which aims to make cities and settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. Eurostat is publishing annual Monitoring reports on progress towards the SDGs in an EU context. City statistics complemented by data by degree of urbanisation are being used to monitor goal 11.

Quality of life in cities and communities - Source: Eurostat

The EU’s Urban Agenda

The EU’s Urban Agenda is an integrated and coordinated approach designed to deal with the urban dimension of EU and national policies. By focusing on concrete issues through dedicated partnerships, the Urban Agenda seeks to improve the quality of life in urban areas. In 2016, EU ministers responsible for urban matters agreed the Pact of Amsterdam, which underlies the Urban Agenda. It is based on the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality, focusing on three key pillars of EU policymaking: better regulation, better funding and better knowledge.

Through a series of dedicated partnerships which involve — on a voluntary and equal basis — cities, EU Member States, the European Commission and stakeholders such as businesses or non-governmental organisations (NGOs), work programmes and actions are designed to successfully tackle the principal challenges that are facing cities as well as contributing towards smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. For more information, see the website of the European Commission.

The purpose of this publication is to provide data suppliers with the necessary information to achieve coherence and comparability of the data collected, and to support users in understanding and interpreting the meaning of the data. The common understanding of what a city and a functional urban area are is crucial for a meaningful analysis of the data. Together with other territorial typologies, these are included in the NUTS amended Regulation, which entered into force at the end of 2017. The Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/1130 of 2 July 2019 on the uniform conditions for the harmonised application of territorial typologies pursuant to Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council C/2019/4877 provides the common EU definition of city and functional urban area. These common definitions guarantee meaningful comparisons across Europe. The integration of cities and functional urban areas into the NUTS Regulation underlines the importance of city statistics as an instrument for targeted policymaking and as a tool for understanding and quantifying the impact of policy decisions for these specific types of territories.

For more information: see the Methodological manual on territorial typologies ('Cluster type', 'Degree of urbanisation' and 'Cities, commuting zones and functional urban areas').

Direct access to

Database

City statistics (urb), see:

Cities and greater cities (urb_cgc)

Functional urban areas (urb_luz)

Perception survey results (urb_percep)

Dedicated section

Cities (Urban Audit)

Publications

This article forms part of Eurostat’s City statistics manual.