Employment in the EU’s environmental economy – including areas such as waste management, management of energy resources and environmental protection activities – rose by 9.5%, on average, in 2022, according to Eurostat.
The increase in employment levels varied by EU member state, rising by 2.8% in Czechia, compared to 38% in Greece.
Some countries, including Malta, Lithuania and Slovakia, saw employment decrease in the same period, Eurostat noted.
Environmental economy
In terms of the areas in which environmental economy employment increased, Italy (+73%), Germany (+34%) and Portugal (+48%) experienced a significant increase of employment in energy resource management in 2022 compared to the previous year.
Elsewhere, in waste management, Italy saw an employment decrease of 2.5%, while France was up 1.6% and Germany rose by 4.6%. Employment was stable in Spain.
Energy resource management accounted for the highest share of employment within the environmental economy across the EU, with Luxembourg having the highest share, at 70.5%, followed by Sweden at 68.3% and Italy at 61.5%.
At the other end of the scale, Malta had a 3.7% share of employment in energy resource management, Hungary 12.7%, and Cyprus 14.3%. Read more here.
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