All official European Union website addresses are in the europa.eu domain.
See all EU institutions and bodies
An official website of the European Union | How do you know?
Environmental information systems
EN
This dashboard presents landscape fragmentation across 39 European countries using the normalised effective mesh size (meff) indicator, calculated with the CUT methodology. To better understand human pressure on landscapes, the dashboard also introduces fragmented land per capita, a metric that relates fragmentation to population and provides insight into land use efficiency.
Key findings:
- The normalized effective mesh size (meff) indicator, calculated with the CUT methodology, shows a strong relationship with road density and impervious surfaces, confirming its suitability for assessing fragmentation at regional scales.
- The results reveal an important pattern: although cities exhibit the highest overall levels of fragmentation, urban residents are associated with substantially less fragmented land per person than those living in rural areas. These findings support evidence-based land use planning and help inform policies aimed at balancing development needs with the conservation of landscape connectivity across Europe.
