15
where the geographic dimension of country Ui is the sum of its CAPj clusters. For example, Spain has
the three CAP clusters of Pias Vasco, Madrid, and Cataluna, with each cluster consisting of a
different number of regions. This would typify a country with a multi-agglomerate production
structure.
The multi-region CAP model ceases to exist in two cases. First, when the regions in a country
do not meet the adjacent and/or periphery region criteria, it is entirely possible that a country consists
of a collection of regions where each adjoining region meets the core region criteria. This results in a
geographic area of contiguous agglomerates. An example of this would be the collection of core
regions in the German provinces of Baden-Württemberg and Bayern. Second, the model is not
applicable when a country has no periphery regions. In this instance, the adjacent region would
become the growth region, as would be the case in Belgium, between the core region of Liege and the
adjacent region of Namur.
4.3 Data, Criteria, and Methodology
4.3.1 Data
The source of the data used for the analysis of the EU regions is the Eurostat (1993)
publication Portrait of the Regions, Vol. 1 - 4. This publication provides the most uniform data for the
EU 15 Member States. However, the data is not completely uniform across all regions for a number of
reasons: German Unification was completed in October 1990, and Finland, Austria, and Sweden were
admitted to the EU in 1995. For the former East German Lander, the data was supplemented by
information from the European Commission publication, (1994), EC Regional Policies,
Competitiveness and Cohesion, while various Eurostat publications REGIONS - Statistical Yearbook
have provided missing data for the other countries. The regions of all Member States have an
identification code at the NUTS 1, NUTS 2, and NUTS 3 levels.8 Although the regions of Ireland have
a NUTS 2 code, the regional data is not published on a consistent basis. The same is true for Denmark.
This study employs regional data at the NUT 2 level for 1989 and 1990.
8 NUTS is Eurostat’s acronym for ‘Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics’.