Description: When using this data set, it should be bibliographically referred to as 'GISCO NUTS 2003'. The 'GISCO NUTS 2003' dataset represents the NUTS regions by means of region, arc and point topology. The NUTS geographical information is completed by attribute tables and a set of cartographic help lines to better visualise multipart polygonal regions.
The NUTS nomenclature is a hierarchical classification of statistical regions defined by Eurostat. The NUTS classification subdivides the EU economic territory into 3 statistical levels.
The Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the establishment of a common classification of territorial units for statistics (NUTS) was enforced the 11 July 2003. This regulation provided the NUTS classification with a legal background.
Since then, 12 new countries joined the European Union. The NUTS regulation was officially enforced in these 12 countries the day of their accession to the EU.
A non official NUTS-like classification has been defined for the EFTA countries, Croatia and Turkey. For further information about the NUTS classification please check the RAMON Eurostat site at http://ec.europa.eu/comm/eurostat/ramon/nuts/home_regions_en.html
At present, five scale ranges (100K, 1M, 3M, 10M and 20M) are maintained in the GISCO geodatabase. The scale levels 1M to 20M are preliminary data and do not have the same data source as the 100K version (= official version). The polygon and boundary classes delineate the regions while the points provide a label for each region. Associated tables contain basic information such as the region's name.