Country profile on rural characteristics Spain - RuDI

EU25 44,6 16,3 35,6 3,2(Source: Eurostat, Farm Structure Survey 2005)Table 14: Area and utilised agricultural area (UAA) under NATURA 2000 2006.area underNATURA2000 SpecialProtection %area underNATURA 2000Sites ofImportance %UAAunderNATURA2000 %forestareaunderNATURA2000 %ES 18,3 22,6 24,03 9,13EU25 9,9 12,2 10,47 7,11(Source: European Environment Agency, Natura 2000 Barometer)Table 15: Area designated as a risk zone for water quality 2006.ES 12,6EU25 41,4%(Source: Rural Development in the European Union - Statistical and EconomicInformation - Report 2007)3.3 The quality of life in rural areas and diversification of therural economyThe employment in non-agricultural sectors is quite high in rural areas (84,67% inpredominantly rural and 93,46% in intermediate rural areas), thus confirming the factthat economic diversification in rural areas is a matter of fact. The tendency todiversification within agricultural holdings, measured through the share of nonagriculturalactivities carried out on the holding itself (camping sites, accommodation fortourists, etc.) or on another agricultural holding as well as activity in a non-agriculturalenterprise, appears to be moderately high irrespective of type of region, although with aslight prevalence of predominantly rural on intermediate rural areas (Table 20).The employment rate in Spain has rapidly increased from 2000 to 2005, convergingtowards EU25 averages (Table 17). Only in predominantly rural areas unemployment isrising, although moderately (+0,2%). The importance of long-term unemployment (morethan 12 months) is also decreasing, in countertendency with EU25 where it undergoes aslight increase in intermediate rural and in urban areas (Table 19).Spain present a slightly better situation than the EU25 in terms of entrepreneurship,measured as the degree of self-employment (referred to persons working on their ownbusiness farm or professional practice for the purpose of earning a profit). In thisrespect, predominantly rural areas present the highest percentage of self-employees(20,12%).The agricultural sector is characterised by a low level of training of operators: despite thevery rapid pace of growth from 2000 to 2005, sensibly higher than in the rest of theEU25, in 2005 still only 48,77% of operators had reached a medium or high educationlevel, against the 70,82% for EU25 (Table 22). The same rapid growth rate affected thedegree of participation of adults in education and training programmes, which between18