Scope of the Atlas

The geographical scope of this atlas spans 29 European countries for which maps, graphs and figures are designed to provide comparative and overall indications. These countries are the 27 member states of the European Union (referred to as EU 25) plus Norway and Switzerland.

The atlas refers to the 15 states that were members of the European Union until April 30th, 2004 as EU 15. The 10 countries that joined at that time are referred to as NMS 10 (new member states), and Bulgaria and Romania that joined on January 1st, 2007 are refered to as NMS 2.

Countries are designated by their Internet URL extension. Therefore, Germany is designated as DE, Greece as GR, Spain as ES, etc.

When relevant, European data are compared with figures from countries in other regions, like the United States of America (US), Canada (CA) or Japan (JP). Finally, a glossary at the end of the atlas provides definitions for the specific terminology used in texts or titles.