The number at EU level increased from around 816,800 in 2017 to 891,600 in 2022, while in Cyprus the number according to available data decreased from around 1900 in 2017 to 1600 in 2022 .
Notably, the EU-wide figure rose from around 816,800 in 2017 to 891,600 in 2022, while in Cyprus the number according to available data has decreased from around 1900 in 2017 to 1600 in 2022.
It is worth noting that despite the fact that the relevant post by Eurostat was made on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day, the category to which the data refer covers a wide range of professions beyond journalism. More specifically, the “writers” subcategory covers everything from literary writers to people who write speeches, while the “language professionals” subcategory covers everything from translators to interpreters.
Therefore, although the recorded trends can give clues about the situation and the press, the available data cannot lead to specific conclusions.
The biggest decrease in number of people working as writers, journalists or professionals in other occupations related to language use between 2017 and 2022 was recorded in Latvia (-35.6%), followed by Estonia (-34.3%) and Greece (-22.5%).
The largest increase over the same period was recorded in Lithuania (+166.0%), followed by Finland (+31.5%) and Hungary (+30.8%) with much smaller increases.
The countries with the largest share of workers in these sectors in 2022 were Germany (25.6% of all workers in these sectors in the EU), France (12%) and Spain (9.1%). Accordingly, the lowest shares (below 0.5%) were recorded in Malta, Cyprus, Latvia, Estonia and Luxembourg.
Publishing businesses
Regarding the number of businesses in the book and magazine publishing industry, or other publishing activities, in 2022, in across the EU, there were around 80,000, having recorded an increase of 14.3% compared to 2021 (70,000 businesses).
The lowest numbers of businesses in this sector were recorded in Luxembourg (79), Cyprus (93) and Malta (105), while most were recorded in France (23,469), Spain (5,981) and Germany (5,533).
The biggest increases at Member State level between 2021 and 2022 were in France (38.9%), Malta (14.1%) and Latvia (4.8%). The biggest decreases were recorded in Luxembourg (-16.0%), Denmark (-9.0%) and Poland (-7.8%).
In Cyprus , during this period the businesses in this sector decreased from 94 to 93, which corresponds to a slight decrease of 1.1%.
