Artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — Area in Europe
Europe: Artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — Area was 15,660 1000 ha in 2022. ▲ Rising
Artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — Area in Europe, 1992–2022
Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. Measured in 1000 ha.
Analysis
The most recent figure for artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area in Europe is 15,660 1000 ha, measured in 2022. That is the highest value across all 31 years on record.
Compared with earlier readings it is up 1.6% on the previous year and up 8.9% over ten years.
Over the whole period, artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area in Europe peaked at 15,660 1000 ha in 2022 and was at its lowest, 7,512 1000 ha, in 1992.
That places Europe 2nd out of 44 groups with data for 2022, putting it in the top 10%.
The long-run direction has been consistently rising across the 31 years of available data.
Averages by decade
| Decade | Average | Lowest | Highest | Years |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1990s | 8,258 1000 ha | 7,512 1000 ha | 9,102 1000 ha | 8 |
| 2000s | 12,511 1000 ha | 9,388 1000 ha | 14,071 1000 ha | 10 |
| 2010s | 14,680 1000 ha | 14,156 1000 ha | 15,160 1000 ha | 10 |
| 2020s | 15,413 1000 ha | 15,160 1000 ha | 15,660 1000 ha | 3 |
Countries ranked near Europe
- 1 China 12,058 1000 ha compare
- 2 China, mainland 11,872 1000 ha compare
- 3 Russian Federation 2,839 1000 ha compare
- 4 India 2,567 1000 ha compare
- 5 Brazil 2,207 1000 ha compare
More environment data for Europe
- Standard Deviation, annual growth rate 0 % change on previous year (2025)
- Historical exposure to drought — Land soil moisture anomaly -1.75 Percentage change (2025)
- Historical exposure to drought — Cropland soil moisture anomaly -3.33 Percentage change (2025)
- Standard Deviation 0.435 °C (2025)
- Temperature change 2.71 °C (2025)
- Total fibre furnish — Production 101.18 million t (2024)
- Recovered paper — Production 57.94 million t (2024)
- Land area equipped for irrigation — Area 27,700 1000 ha (2024)
- Permanent meadows and pastures — Area 170,878 1000 ha (2024)
- Permanent meadows and pastures — Share in Agricultural land 37.54 % (2024)
Frequently asked questions
- What is artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area in Europe?
- Artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area in Europe was 15,660 1000 ha in 2022, according to Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
- What is the highest artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area recorded in Europe?
- The highest recorded value was 15,660 1000 ha in 2022.
- What is the lowest artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area recorded in Europe?
- The lowest recorded value was 7,512 1000 ha in 1992.
- How does Europe rank for artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area?
- Europe ranks 2nd out of 44 groups with data for 2022.
- Is artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — area rising or falling in Europe?
- Over the last ten years it is up 8.9%. The long-run trend across the full record is rising.
- Where does this Europe data come from?
- The figures come from Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, published as part of Artificial surfaces (including urban and associated areas) — Area from CCI_LC. Statizoid updates them automatically from the source API.
Download this data
CSV · JSON — 31 observations, free to reuse under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO (FAO).
About this data
The FAOSTAT domain on Land Cover data under the Agri-Environmental Indicators section contains land cover information organized by the land cover classes of the international standard system for Environmental and Economic Accounting Central Framework (SEEA CF). The land cover information is compiled from publicly available Global Land Cover (GLC) maps: a) MODIS land cover types based on the Land Cover Classification System, LCCS; b) The European Spatial Agency (ESA) Climate Change Initiative (CCI) annual land cover maps produced by the Université catholique de Louvain (UCL)-Geomatics and now under the European Copernicus Program; c) The annual land cover maps which were produced under the European Copernicus Global Land Service (CGLS) (CGLS land cover, containing discrete land cover categorization), with spatial resolution 100m; and d) the WorldCover maps of the European Space Agency, produced at 10m resolution.