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Type of indicator |
Environment |
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Indicator C31 |
Land Cover |
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Definition |
The indicator measures the area in the different categories of land cover.
It consists of 6 sub-indicators: 1. agricultural area 2. natural grassland 3. forest area 4. transitional woodland-shrub 5. semi-natural area 6. wetlands and water bodies
Land cover is the actual distribution of forests, water, desert, grassland and other physical features of the land, including those created by human activities. Land use, on the other hand, characterises the human use of a land cover type. The data source used is CORINE Land Cover (CLC). CLC databases are obtained through computer-assisted interpretation of satellite images acquired in 1990, 2000, 2006, 2012 and 2018 offering the possibility to describe the geographic distribution of specific land cover changes in a geo-referenced approach. CLC describes land cover (and partly land use) with a three-level nomenclature of 44 classes. For the purpose of this indicator, they have been grouped so as to obtain the four classes of agricultural, forest, natural and artificial land cover. CLC was elaborated based on the visual interpretation of satellite images (IRS, RapidEye, Spot, Landsat TM and MSS). Ancillary data (aerial photographs, topographic or vegetation maps, statistics, local knowledge) is used to refine interpretation and assign classes. The CLC database is based on a standard production methodology characterised by the following elements: Mapping scale is 1:100 000. Mapping accuracy is 100 m. The minimum mapping unit for the inventory is 25 ha for areas, and 100 m for linear elements.
It should be noted that other sources may give significantly different results, but CLC has a uniform methodology and nomenclature across Europe. Moreover, it is the only dataset which is complete for the EU-28. Nevertheless, in order to reduce and explain the discrepancies with other surveys and national inventories, the estimation of agricultural areas and forest includes separately the CLC classes "Natural grassland" and "Transitional woodland –shrubs", which are, in most cases, likely to be critical in the estimation.
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Unit of measurement |
1-6: share of total area |
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Data source |
CORINE Land Cover (CLC) 2018
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References/location of the data |
European Environment Agency https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/data/copernicus-land-monitoring-service-corine https://land.copernicus.eu/pan-european/corine-land-cover/clc2018 https://land.copernicus.eu/pan-european/corine-land-cover/lcc-2012-2018
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Data collection level |
National Regional (NUTS 2). |
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Frequency |
CORINE Land Cover: 6 years |
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Delay |
CORINE Land Cover: 3 years |
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Comments/caveats |
CLC classes used are, by sub-indicator: 1: CLC class 1 2: CLC class 2 3: CLC class 3 4: CLC class 4 5: CLC class 5 6: CLC class 6 |