Regional specialisation within transport services

Transport services include land, air and water transport, as well as supporting and auxiliary transport services. In the EU-27, employment in these services reached a total of 9 million persons in 2006, equivalent to 6.9% of all employment in the non-financial business economy. Among the four NACE divisions that make up transport services, the largest by far is land transport (including transport via pipelines), with more than half of all transport services employment. Several of the regions within the EU and Norway that are most specialised in transport services are in fact particularly specialised in one type of service. The most notable example is the Finnish island region of Åland, which has by far the highest employment specialisation of any region in the EU-27 and Norway, largely due to its exceptionally high specialisation in water transport services.