Statistical presentation

Data description

Land accounts has three parts. Denmark's area in square kilometers in total and by municipalities and regions, land by land cover and land use by industry.

Denmark's area

These statistics show the size of Denmark's land area in total and by municipalities and regions, per 1st of January. As of 2011, these statistics are based on data from the Danish Geodata Agency's cadastral register. Only matriculated areas are included, which means that many lakes are not covered. For municipalities with un-matriculated lakes, the area will therefore be smaller compared with previous figures. Per 1 January 2011-2013, roads in Copenhagen and Frederiksberg are not matriculated and therefore not included in the measured area.

Land by land cover

Land by land cover is an estimate of how much of Denmark is covered by roads, buildings, agricultural crops, forest, different types of habitats, lakes, etc. Land by land cover is estimated based on the consolidation of several map sources. These statistics are published both as absolute figures (square kilometers), in percent and as square meter per capita.

Land use by industry

Land use by industry is an estimate of how much land is used for different purposes, i.e. housing, industry, trade, recreational facilities, etc. This is based on a number of administrative sources (registers) in combination with the land register. These statistics are published both as absolute figures (square kilometers), in percent and as square meter per capita.

Classification system

Land cover is classified based on UN's SEEA (System for Environmental-Economic Accounting), with some adaption for Danish context. An overview of the classification is available in this file arealdække_nøglefil.pdf.

Land use is classified based on UN's SEEA, but with modifications to harmonise to industry groupings used in Danish National Accounts.

The geographical classification is according to Danish administrative units by regions, provinces and municipalities. Area not part of the cadastral map is not assigned to the administrative level, and thus not included in municipalities.

Sector coverage

Land use by industry cover all sectors.

Statistical concepts and definitions

Land Use: The functional or socio-economic use of land, e.g. for dwellings, for production or for recreation.

Land Cover: The physical or biological surface

Built-up areas:

Buildings: Areas covered by buildings of all types. The source is Kort10.

Woody crops: Orchards, Christmas trees, etc. Does not include permanent extensive crops like grass.

Unclassified: Areas for which the sources do not have information on land cover, even after methods to remove small slivers of unclassified areas have been applied.

Agricultural crops: All agricultural crops, including permanent crops such as orchards and Christmas trees - as well as fallow.

Crops, unspecified: Areas covered by the field block map, but not covered by the field parcel map containing crop codes.

Herbaceous crops: All intensively grown, annual crops - like cereals, tubers, vegetables, seeds etc.

Other artificial surfaces: Contains the 2 subcategories of land cover: 'parks, sports facilities and recreational areas', and 'pits and quarries'.

Parks, sport facilities and recreational areas: Areas with public access used mainly for recreational purposes. Includes burial sites, camping grounds, zoological gardens, amusement parks etc.

Permanent grass and other extensive crops: Permanent grass, fallow as well as fields that are left unplowed for environmental protection purposes. The technical report lists all the crop codes which are classified as extensive.

Forest: Area covered with trees. Christmas trees and orchards are not included, these are classified as 'woody crops'. Also lakes, streams, bogs, unpaved road etc. inside forests are classified as respectively lake, stream, bog etc. as these map layers take priority in BASEMAP03.

Statistical unit

Land cover is classified by 10×10 meter raster cells.

Land use is classified by land parcels in the Cadastre. The unit is however 'shares of land parcels', as the area of a parcel is distributed to several uses, if there are more than one registered use (as described under 'Statistical processing').

Statistical population

Land area of Denmark

Reference area

Denmark (Greenland and the Faeroe Islands are not included).

Time coverage

Denmark's area cover the time period from 2007 and onwards.

Land by land cover is estimated for 2011, 2016, 2018 and 2021.

Land use by industry is estimated for 2016.

Base period

Not relevant for this statistics.

Unit of measure

Figures are published in sqaure kilometres, percentages as well as square meter per capita.

Reference period

The reference time differs slightly for the different source maps used for the land cover account. In all cases, the newest map available mid 2022 has been used. See more under 'sources'. For land use (2016), the reference time is registers as of 1 Jan 2016.

Frequency of dissemination

The accounts do not have a regular frequency, but have been published every 2-3 years.

Legal acts and other agreements

All data are from registers or public data. There is no separate data collection for this statistics.

There is no EU regulation for this statistics.

Cost and burden

The statistics are based on already available data sources and registers. Therefore, there is no direct response burden.

Comment

For more information contact Statistics Denmark directly.