Title: Regional Profile Report - Central Europe

3.1. General information
The so called “FLOEZ” region is a construct of nine municipalities representing the biggest
former hard coal mining region in Saxony. The cooperation initiative was founded in 2005.
The name “FLOEZ” is short for “Future for Lugau-Oelsnitz-Zwickau” 25 . The term indicates the
composition of the region, which incorporates two former mining areas: the Zwickau coal
mining district (Zwickauer Revier) and the mining district of Lugau-Oelsnitz (Lugau-Oelsnitzer
Revier). Both districts are geographically located in the “Ore Mountain Basin”
(Erzgebirgisches Becken), between the Saxon Uplands (Sächsisches Hügelland) in the north
and the “Ore mountains” (Erzgebirge) in the south.
The FLOEZ region spans across an area of 273 km² and counted 162.959 inhabitants in
2007 26 . It includes the city of Zwickau as regional centre, and the eight surrounding sub-
urban or rural communities of Reinsdorf, Mülsen, Lichtenstein, Hohndorf, Gersdorf, Lugau,
Oelsnitz/Erzgebirge and Hartenstein.
The FLOEZ region is part of Saxony, a Free State of the Federal Republic of Germany
(NUTS 1 “DED”). All FLOEZ municipalities are part of the regional administrative unit of
Chemnitz (Direktionsbezirk Chemnitz) (NUTS 2 “DED1”). The nine municipalities are located
in two different administrative districts (Landkreise) on NUTS 3 level: “Zwickau” and
“Erzgebirgskreis” 27 .
25 Already the name indicates the focus on mining traditions - “Floez” is the German term for “bed of (coal)”
26 Data: Own compilation (Source: Gemeindedatenbank Sachsen, 31th of December 2007)
27 Due to the reform of the regional administrative regions in Saxony 2008, the existing NUTS CODES do not
(for the time of the writing this report) represent the new statistical and administrative units in Saxony
Regional Profile Zwickau-Lugau-Oelsnitz
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