Economic indicators by access to city typology — Population by country

About this data

Indicator

Economic indicators by access to city typology — Population

Unit

Persons

Source

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

Licence

OECD Terms and Conditions (attribution required)

Coverage

40 places, 1,164 data points, 1995–2025

Last refreshed

17 August 2026

This dataset provides economic indicators aggregated at national level and broken down by territorial typology according to the population's access to cities. Data source and definition The indicators include GDP, GDP per capita, gross value added, employment at place of work and labour productivity by type of territory. Data is collected from Eurostat (reg_eco10) for EU countries and via delegates of the OECD Working Party on Territorial Indicators (WPTI), as well as from national statistical offices' websites. The indicators are aggregated data at the national level, using the typology of small (TL3) regions to calculate totals or averages for all metropolitan large regions, metropolitan midsize regions, near a midsize/large FUA regions, near a small FUA regions and remote regions. Territorial typology on the population's access to cities Territorial typologies helps to assess differences in socio-economic trends in regions, both within and across countries and to highlight the specific issues faced by each type of region. The OECD territorial typology on access to cities uses the concept of functional urban areas (FUA) – composed of urban centres and their commuting areas – and classifies small (TL3) regions (Fadic et al., 2019) according to the following criteria: Metropolitan regions, if more than half of the population live in a FUA. Metropolitan regions are further classified into: metropolitan large, if more than half of the population live in a (large) FUA of at least 1.5 million inhabitants; and metropolitan midsize, if more than half of the population live in a (midsize) FUA of at 250 000 to 1.5 million inhabitants. Non-metropolitan regions, if less than half of the population live in a midsize/large FUA. These regions are further classified according to their level of access to FUAs of different sizes: near a midsize/large FUA if more than half of the population live within a 60-minute drive from a midsize/large FUA (of more than 250 000 inhabitants) or if the TL3 region contains more than 80% of the area of a midsize/large FUA; near a small FUA if the region does not have access to a midsize/large FUA and at least half of its population have access to a small FUA (i.e. between 50 000 and 250 000 inhabitants) within a 60-minute drive, or contains 80% of the area of a small FUA; and remote, otherwise. List of OECD regions and typologies are presented in the OECD Territorial correspondence table (xlsx). Maps of For more information, see the OECD Territorial grid (pdf). Cite this dataset OECD Regions, Cities and Local Areas database http://oe.cd/geostats. Further information OECD Regions and Cities Statistical Atlas OECD Regions and Cities at a Glance For questions and/or comments, please email RegionStat@oecd.org.