Explanatory Memorandum to COM(2016)788 - Amendment of Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 as regards the territorial typologies (Tercet) - Main contents
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This page contains a limited version of this dossier in the EU Monitor.
| dossier | COM(2016)788 - Amendment of Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 as regards the territorial typologies (Tercet). |
|---|---|
| source | COM(2016)788  |
| date | 13-12-2016 |
1. CONTEXT OF THE PROPOSAL
• Reasons for and objectives of the proposal
Eurostat publishes European statistics in many statistical domains at regional level according to Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 ( 1 ) on the establishment of a common classification of territorial units for statistics (NUTS). These statistics are widely used in the context of EU regional policy and to determine eligibility for regions under the cohesion funds. Over the past few years, Eurostat has expanded the range of statistics published on a number of territorial typologies to address EU policy-makers’ increasing need for such data in the context of cohesion and territorial development policies. The Commission has defined these territorial typologies in cooperation with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), and adopted methodologies to set up and maintain them. The NUTS Regulation does not yet include or legally define these territorial typologies to determine urban, rural, coastal and/or other areas and regions in the EU, although they are already being used. The fact that these typologies and their methodologies have no legal recognition and are not formally recognised by the European Statistical System (ESS) is an issue that needs to be addressed to establish them as recognised, impartial and transparent statistical typologies.
The main policy objectives of the initiative are the following.
Contents
- 1. Establish a legal recognition of territorial typologies, including the definition of cities, for the purpose of European statistics
- 2. Lay down the core definitions and statistical criteria for the different territorial typologies
- 3. Ensure harmonised and transparent application and use of the territorial typologies at EU level and in Member States
1. Establish a legal recognition of territorial typologies, including the definition of cities, for the purpose of European statistics
A regulation amending Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 will integrate the territorial typologies into the current NUTS Regulation. This will make it possible for thematic statistical regulations and policy initiatives to refer to these territorial typologies for the purpose of collecting European statistics and/or to target specific territories such as cities, urban, rural or coastal areas and regions in policy. The initiative will therefore cover the existing territorial typologies based on NUTS level 3 (e.g. urban-rural typology, metropolitan regions), the local administrative units (e.g. degree of urbanisation, cities, coastal areas) and the 1 km² grid level required to calculate the other typologies, which are based on population distribution and density in the grid cells.
2. Lay down the core definitions and statistical criteria for the different territorial typologies
To create methodological transparency and to safeguard the stability of the territorial typologies over time, the core definitions and criteria for creating and updating the typologies need to be specified in the regulation and its implementing provisions. For this purpose, the initiative will use the already existing methodologies for the different typologies.
3. Ensure harmonised and transparent application and use of the territorial typologies at EU level and in Member States
The initiative aims to improve the comparability and stability of the typologies. This will have a positive impact on the compilation and dissemination of European regional statistics.
4. In the context of the alignment of Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 to the new rules of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), powers currently conferred on the Commission by that regulation to adopt acts designed to amend non-essential elements of the regulation by supplementing it, in accordance with the regulatory procedure with scrutiny, should be provided for by powers to adopt delegated acts.
• Consistency with existing policy provisions in the policy area
This proposal would incorporate typologies into the NUTS Regulation which interlink with several statistical domains, like regional accounts, the labour market, rural development, agriculture, tourism, maritime policy and more. It would make it possible to aggregate data according to clear-cut typologies: for instance making it possible to compare GDP in rural as opposed to urban areas, tourist nights spent in coastal as opposed to non-coastal areas and regions, employment/unemployment by degree of urbanisation and much more.
Concepts like the degree of urbanisation can also be used to supply data to the UN on urban and rural areas.
• Consistency with other Union policies
The territorial typologies have a major impact on regional policies under the overarching objectives of the Europe 2020 initiative( 2 ). For instance, EU cohesion policies aim to reduce disparities among EU regions and to promote growth, employment and sustainable development in disadvantaged regions and areas. Over the past few years, there has been a greater focus on evidence-based policy interventions and more integrated territorial approaches that reflect the diversity of EU regions, e.g. in terms of employment, demography, poverty, education or economic activity. Analyses of regional policies emphasise the need to investigate the significant urban-rural differences, which are not uniform across Member States (see, for example, the Sixth report on economic, social and territorial Cohesion ( 3 )). Cohesion policy 2014-2020 emphasises territorial development strategies focusing on urban and rural, but also coastal areas. The principles for the Cohesion Policy 2014-2020 set out in the Common Strategic Framework ( 4 ) stress that the approaches to promoting smart, sustainable and inclusive growth must reflect the role of cities, urban, rural and coastal areas and take urban-rural linkages into account. The degree of urbanisation typology was recently used in Regulation (EU) No 522/2014 ( 5 ) to define eligibility for European Regional Development Fund support to carry out innovative actions in cities or towns and suburbs.
2. LEGAL BASIS, SUBSIDIARITY AND PROPORTIONALITY
• Legal basis
Article 338 TFEU provides the legal basis for European statistics. Acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure, the European Parliament and the Council adopt measures for the production of statistics where this is necessary for the EU to carry out its role.
• Subsidiarity (for non-exclusive competence)
The subsidiarity principle applies insofar as the proposal does not fall under the exclusive competence of the EU. Member States acting independently cannot sufficiently achieve the objectives of the proposed action, namely introducing the necessary components with regard to territorial typologies. Action can be taken more efficiently at EU level, on the basis of an EU legal act, to establish, coordinate and maintain harmonised statistical classifications, including territorial typologies for statistical purposes at EU level.
• Proportionality
The initiative proposes to amend the current NUTS Regulation not more than absolutely necessary. Given the need for a formal recognition of territorial typologies for statistics and policy-making, it aims to amend the NUTS Regulation to incorporate the territorial typologies into the legal framework without modifying the fundamental principles or the structure and definitions of the NUTS regions, which are well accepted, well proven and undisputed.
This option is considered the most balanced approach to reconciling the need to take action with the intention to limit the scope of the initiative to the minimum required to achieve the objectives. Since it is a legal codification of existing typologies and their components and the Commission (Eurostat) will manage the assignment of the typologies, it entails only negligible additional costs for national statistical institutes and no costs for businesses or citizens.
• Choice of instrument
Proposed instrument: a regulation.
Given the objectives and content of the proposal and the fact that this is a proposal amending an existing regulation, a regulation is the most appropriate instrument.
3. RESULTS OF EX-POST EVALUATIONS, STAKEHOLDER CONSULTATIONS AND IMPACT ASSESSMENTS
• Ex-post evaluations/fitness checks of existing legislation
The existing legislation does not yet include the typologies, making it very difficult to establish and to ensure uniform conditions for harmonised application.
• Stakeholder consultations
The stakeholders this proposal affects are mainly the Member States’ national statistical institutes. The Commission (Eurostat) involved their experts since the very early stages and very much relied on their feedback and expertise in drafting the proposal.
As the main policy user of regional data, the Commission’s Directorate-General for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO) was consulted several times and also provided valuable feedback.
Given the technical nature of this proposal, it was not considered necessary to involve any other body.
• Collection and use of expertise
The concepts of the typologies were developed in close collaboration with Eurostat, DG REGIO and the Joint Research Centre, which provided core technical input, and the OECD, by bringing together a number of previously existing concepts and their different methodologies.
The OECD uses the harmonised typologies for statistical and analytical purposes too.
• Impact assessment
No impact assessment was carried out because the proposal does not have significant economic, social and environmental consequences and imposes no additional burden on businesses or citizens. The initiative aims mainly to complement the current NUTS Regulation with the necessary elements to take into account recent developments in territorial classifications for statistical purposes.
• Regulatory fitness and simplification
The codification of the territorial typologies in the NUTS Regulation makes it unnecessary to define and explain them in other specific legal acts, for instance acts related to cities or rural development. This simplifies and harmonises legislation related to urban and rural development and maritime policy.
• Fundamental rights
This proposal does not affect fundamental rights.
4. BUDGETARY IMPLICATIONS
The proposal has no implications for the EU budget.
5. OTHER ELEMENTS
• Implementation plans and monitoring, evaluation and reporting arrangements
Since, despite not being legally recognised, the typologies are already in use, it is not planned to draw up any particular implementation plans or monitoring provisions. In principle, the procedure to determine and publish the typologies is the following.
The Commission (Eurostat) does the necessary calculations to assign the typologies when new data on population distribution and density in the grid cells become available. This is usually the case after a census. Smaller updates to capture changes in the local or regional structure of the Member States can be done annually for the Member States concerned.
After the Commission (Eurostat) has done these initial calculations, it shares the results with the Member States. They can verify or modify them on the basis of particular geographical circumstances for example.
After agreeing on the results with the Member States, the Commission (Eurostat) publishes them on the dedicated websites.
It is necessary to put uniform conditions in place to harmonise the typologies. The Commission should be empowered to do so for the implementation of the typologies by way of implementing acts.
• Detailed explanation of the specific provisions of the proposal
Since the proposal does not change the widely accepted and well proven essence of the NUTS Regulation, it amends no more than absolutely necessary to achieve its objectives.
It is proposed to amend or replace some provisions of Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 for the following reasons.
- Article 1
The new Article 1 broadens the subject matter of the NUTS Regulation by adding the territorial typologies and the statistical grids needed to calculate them based on the population distribution and density in the single grid cells. It also clarifies the role and labelling of the local administrative units (LAU), whose labelling is inconsistent in the current NUTS Regulation (such as ‘components of NUTS’ and ‘smaller administrative units’).
- Article 2
In Article 2, paragraph 5 is deleted. It refers to a communication that was due in 2005, two years after the entry into force of the original NUTS Regulation in 2003. It is therefore obsolete.
- Article 3
In Article 3, paragraph 4 is adapted to the new institutional procedures introduced by the Lisbon Treaty (by changing from the regulatory procedure with scrutiny to delegated acts).
In paragraph 5, the last sentence is deleted since it is no longer relevant to attribute any power to the Commission in that respect.
- Article 4
Article 4 sets out the LAU. The provisions on the transmission requirements are also clarified and simplified. These were previously not understood in a coherent way.
Finally, the Commission is given the power to adopt delegated acts to adapt the list of LAU in Annex III of the NUTS Regulation.
- Article 4a
Article 4a is inserted to introduce the statistical grids that the Commission (Eurostat) will maintain and publish, as a basis for calculating the territorial typologies for the regions and areas.
- Article 4b
The new Article 4b introduces the typologies themselves and gives the Commission implementing power to put uniform conditions in place for their harmonised application.
- Article 5
In the new Article 5, the wording and phrasing are clarified and simplified. The Commission is given the power to adopt delegated acts to adapt the NUTS classification in Annex I of the NUTS Regulation.
- Articles 7 and 7a
Article 7 is updated to refer to the competent committee that assists the Commission when adopting implementing acts, while the new Article 7a concerns the exercise of delegation in accordance with the Interinstitutional Agreement on Better Law-Making.
- Article 8
Article 8 is deleted. It stipulated a report on the implementation of the NUTS Regulation that was due in 2006, three years after the entry into force of the original NUTS Regulation in 2003. It is therefore obsolete.