Glossary:Geographical information system at the Commission (GISCO)

From Statistics Explained

A geographical information system, abbreviated as GIS, integrates hardware, software and data for capturing, managing, analysing and displaying all forms of geographically referenced information. It makes it possible to map the location, quantities or densities of objects, and to analyse spatial relationships and visualise data and statistics in ways that reveal interactions and patterns.

The Geographical information system at the Commission, abbreviated as GISCO, is a permanent Eurostat service providing geographical services within the European Commission and the European statistical system.  GISCO purchases and maintains geographic reference datasets and develops tools for analysing and mapping.

GISCO encourages the increasing geo-referencing of statistics produced by the Member States.

GISCO promotes projects to develop links between geographical and statistical data. These projects aim at optimising the use of information already collected to achieve efficiencies in statistical production and to increase the analytical and communication power of the data. Complex issues are increasingly analysed or illustrated by maps.

GISCO represents Eurostat in the Geostat project and in the European Forum for Geostatistics. This forum is a European-wide geo-statistical community with the objective of integrating geographical and statistical data.

GISCO is one of the leaders of the INSPIRE initiative, supporting the implementation of the directive for the establishment of a European Spatial Data Infrastructure.

Users looking for publicly available European datasets on specific themes such as NUTS, can access the Geodatafiles on the GISCO section on the Eurostat public website from where datasets can be downloaded in spatial data formats. Users who want to visualise statistical data in the form of maps, can use the Table Graph Map (TGM) web application that gives access to statistical data from the Eurostat statistical database. 

Further information

• Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 March 2007 establishing an Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community (INSPIRE) 14.03.2007
• GISCO on the Eurostat website
• LUCAS on the Eurostat website
• NUTS on the Eurostat website

Related concepts

• Land use - cover area frame survey (LUCAS)
• Nomenclature of territorial units for statistics (NUTS)

Statistical data

• Land cover and land use statistics at regional level