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Bulgaria's north-western region poorest in Europe

Bulgaria has maintained its status as the European Union's poorest state, with five of the seven poorest regions in the block all in the country, Eurostat said.

The report took into account regional gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in 2008. The 20 poorest regions in the EU were all in Bulgaria, Romania, Poland and Hungary.

Bulgaria's north-western region, with 28 per cent of the EU average GDP, was ranked bottom of the ranking. The north-central (30 per cent of the average), south-central (30 per cent of the average), south-eastern and north-eastern (36 and 37 per cent, respectively) were just above. The south-western region, which includes capital Sofia, ranked much higher with 73 per cent of the EU average.

On the other end of the spectrum, it was no surprise that the leading regions in the union are Inner London (343 per cent of the average), the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg (279 per cent), Brussels in Belgium (216 per cent), Groningen in the Netherlands (198 per cent), Hamburg in Germany (188 per cent) and Prague in the Czech Republic (172 per cent).

Among the top twenty richest locations, four were in the UK, four in Germany, three in the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Slovakia were the only former communist states to be ranked that high.

Among the 40 regions exceeding 125 per cent of the EU average level, 10 were in Germany, five in the Netherlands, four each in Austria and the UK, three each in Spain and Italy, two each in Belgium and Finland, one each in the Czech Republic, Denmark, Ireland, France, Slovakia and Sweden, as well as the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, according to the data.

Among the 64 regions below the 75 per cent level, 15were in Poland, seven each in the Czech Republic and Romania, six each in Bulgaria and Hungary, four each in Italy and Portugal, three each in Greece, France (all overseas departments) and Slovakia, two in the UK, one in Spain, as well as Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, Eurostat said.