Leaving the parental home is considered a milestone in the transition from childhood to adulthood. The reasons behind this step may vary from being materially independent to studying, working, moving in with a partner, getting married and having children, etc. However, the path to independence may not be straightforward and may occur at different ages […]
Artificial Intelligence and Internet of Things in EU enterprises
Modern smart technologies bring changes to EU enterprises. Such smart technologies include artificial intelligence (AI), which gives machines and systems the capability to learn and make decisions with some degree of autonomy to achieve specific goals. It also includes the smart environment called the Internet of Things (IoT), where machines, devices, sensors or systems are interconnected and […]
EU’s need for natural gas imports reduced to 83% by 2021
In 2021, the EU’s natural gas import dependency rate was 83%. This is 1 percentage point (pp) less than 2020 (84%). This small decrease in import dependency was significantly influenced by the fact that most EU Member States used stocks of natural gas that were imported in previous years. In fact, the drop in natural gas stocks in 2021 was […]
Renewable energies continue to be an upward trend
In 2020, solid fossil fuels (coal) continued the downward trend of previous years and clocked another 18.3% fall, decreasing for the fifth consecutive year. Compared with 2015, it has dropped by 40%. Their share in the supply mix is now barely above 10%, while in 1990, it was 25.7%. Although oil (34.5%) and natural gas […]
Tourism nights booked online drop by almost 50% in 2020
In 2020, guests spent around 272 million nights in short-term rental accommodation in the EU booked via Airbnb, Booking, Expedia Group or Tripadvisor, representing a decrease of around 47% compared with 2019, the year before the COVID-19 pandemic. These data on short-stay accommodation offered via these platforms are the result of a landmark agreement between the European Commission and […]
How many people verified online information in 2021?
In 2021, 47% of all people aged 16-74 years in the EU saw untrue or doubtful information on news websites or social media during the 3 months prior to the survey. However, only around a quarter (23%) of people verified the truthfulness of the information or content. This information comes from data on ICT usage in households and […]
Tourism nights booked online drop by almost 50% in 2020
In 2020, guests spent around 272 million nights in short-term rental accommodation in the EU booked via Airbnb, Booking, Expedia Group or Tripadvisor, representing a decrease of around 47% compared with 2019, the year before the COVID-19 pandemic. These data on short-stay accommodation offered via these platforms are the result of a landmark agreement between the European Commission and […]
Spain’s top maritime freight transport and commerce in Algeciras, Valencia, and Barcelona
Weight of goods handled by EU ports dropped by 7% in 2020. In 2020, EU ports handled around 3.3 billion tonnes of goods in gross weight, a substantial decrease compared with 2019 (-7%). This fall can be attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent restrictions put in place across the Member States and worldwide. After reaching a new […]
How digitalised are EU’s enterprises?
The uptake of digital technologies by businesses has the potential to improve services and products as well as to increase competitiveness. The crisis caused by COVID-19 has also shown that digitalization is a crucial tool to improving the economic resilience of businesses. In 2020, only 1% of EU enterprises with at least 10 persons employed reached a […]