However, after hitting a low in 2014, there has been a slow but steady recovery, albeit at a slower pace if compared to other European Union nations, the study said.
It revealed that, after reaching an economic peak in 2008, the GDP per capita in purchasing power standards has fallen across the EU due to the economic crisis and subsequent recession.
Countries have generally managed to improve since then, as regional economies have gingerly recovered.
As far as Cyprus is concerned, GDP per capita stood at €27,500 in 2008 before falling to €25,800 in 2009 and plunging as low as €22,400 in 2014.
After hitting rock bottom, however, Cyprus started a slow recovery, edging up to €23,700 in 2015, €24,500 in 2016 and €24,540 in 2017.
Eurostat also reported that in approximately half of 280 EU NUTS level 2 regions, GDP per capita had returned to or risen above its 2008 level within two years.
The NUTS classification, a nomenclature of territorial units for statistics, is a hierarchical system for dividing up the economic territory of the EU.
In a further 111 EU NUTS, GDP per inhabitant remained below its 2008 level for between three and eight years.
More generally, in most regions in the north, west and east of the EU, GDP per capita had stayed above or returned above their 2008 level by 2013, with the exceptions of the majority of Finland, Sweden, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Croatia and Slovenia entirely, and a few regions of Czechia, all of which registered a faster recovery.
The main concentration of regions whose GDP per capita was still below its 2008 level by 2014 was in the southern EU Member States of Greece, Spain, Italy, Cyprus and Portugal.
In 10 regions, GDP per capita rose rather than fell in 2009. Six of these regions were in Poland, two in France (Corsica, Guyane) and one each in Greece (Dytiki Makedonia) and Finland (Åland).
Most of these 10 regions experienced an uninterrupted increase in their GDP per capita despite the crisis. This was the case in Corsica (France) and the six Polish regions. The other three regions — Dytiki Makedonia (Greece), Guyane (France) and Åland (Finland) — recorded a fall one year later. In other words, their GDP per inhabitant peaked in 2009 rather than in 2008.
Source: Cyprus Mail
