In this episode, we talk about Europe's renewable energy and its ambition to become the world's first carbon-neutral economy. We look at the emerging success story of the EU's 27 member countries and their renewable energy strategies. Madeleine Mahovsky, head of the Energy Statistics Unit at Eurostat, talks about the new agenda of the EU, the European Green Deal, and the target to become the first climate-neutral continent in 2050. She also looks at the new REPowerEU initiative to raise the share of EU’s renewable energy to 45% by 2030.Julian Prime, the head of Electricity, Renewables and Coal Statistics at the International Energy Agency, explains the emerging potential of hydrogen to boost renewables and why it is important that bio fuels don't interfere with food production.In a conversation with Jonathan Elliott we discuss why renewable energy production has increased in the EU and how new technologies like solar PV and wind have increased enormously over the last few years to reduce our carbon emissions.

This episode looks at the winning entries in the European Statistics Competition. The competition invites secondary-school students to create two-minute films presenting official statistics on the topic “Environment”. Over 17,000 students from 19 different countries across Europe entered this year’s contest.
Tim Allen from Eurostat explains why data analysis and communication work go hand in hand. The participating students were asked to demonstrate their skills by finding and analyzing data and then presenting them in in a video for the competition.
Joanna Karlowska-Pik, a professor from Poland, talks about inspiration, creativity and originality she has found in students and how she prepares them for the competition by supporting their individual talents and ideas.
Glen Campbell, a jury member from the Publications Office (European Commission), explains the criteria used to judge the competitors and why technical perfection is not the key to telling a good story.
Students from the winning teams from Bulgaria, Italy and Slovenia share their experiences with creating the videos and what they learned in the process.
In a conversation with Jonathan Elliott about this competition, we find out how all these factors decided the eventual winners and learn about the range and talent demonstrated by students with their very creative and original videos.

In this episode, we're going to talk about the prices of things and what happens when they just won't stop going up. Europe is in the grip of inflation fever, and that is affecting everyone. So what's going on? Prices are numbers, and they're everywhere. From supermarkets to petrol stations, online and offline. So, maybe we can find out what's going on with the EU's inflation problem and what might be done about it.Professor Ludwig von Auer from the University of Trier explains why your purchasing power decreases, when wages don't rise in line with price inflation. And why we have to worry about an inflation that is now almost 8%. Paul Konijn from Eurostat explains how price information is gathered, with dedicated staff touring shops and service providers across Europe, to gather data on the pricesof goods and services. These prices are now hitting a 25 year high.In a conversation with Jonathan Elliott on this topic, we find out that inflation can produce winners and losers and discuss the reasons central banks hesitate to respond by increasing interest rates.

2022 is the ‘European Year of Youth’ and we are going to focus on the world of work for young people and the effects that the COVID pandemic has had and continues to have on it. The transition from school to work can sometimes be complicated and the pandemic has made that transition even more tricky. How the world has changed for young people aged 15 to 29 in Europe to find work.
Anna Emilia Martin from Eurostat reveals that there are 71 million young people in Europe corresponding to 21% of the working age population and that a lot of them have atypical working schemes and work often outside the normal working hours.
Niall O'Higgins, senior economist from the International Labour Organization Agency highlights that there was a big shift towards working online and teleworking became the norm for a lot of people and young people actually have a much faster learning curve and have higher wage rates than older people in the world of digital work.
In a conversation with Jonathan Elliott on this topic, we find out what it means for young people who are transitioning from education to work.

Are we saving the planet with our recycling or ruining it with more packaging and consumption? Is there now less pollution, or more in Europe?
Oscar Gomez from Eurostat reveals that the amount of waste generated has grown 6% over the past 10 years, this is four times faster than population growth but is about 1/3 slower than economic growth and explains why this is actually a good thing.
Ioannis Bakas, an expert from the European Environment Agency highlights that the best way to reduce waste is not to produce it at all. Listen to Ioannis explain how recycling is the only form of giving packaging products a second life, and why shipping waste for recycling over a long distance, instead of burning or dumping it, is not always a bad thing.
In a conversation with Jonathan Elliott on this topic, we find out what is really going on when it comes to recycling our waste in Europe. We also ask people in the street what they think about recycling and how they want to promote the reduction of waste.

In spring 2020, EU countries went into a lockdown because of the global COVID pandemic. The lockdowns and travel restrictions had a significant effect on people’s travel habits.
Two years on, we ask Christophe Demunter from Eurostat how the changes in the way we travel are reflected in the tourism statistical data. Before the pandemic, about two thirds of people in the EU travelled, while in 2020, the number of people who took at least one trip away from home dropped to under 50%.
It is no surprise that airline travel saw a large drop, but on the other hand, hotel accommodation numbers suffered relatively less – why is that? Christophe explains some of the reasons behind this difference.
Ulf Sonntag from the German research institute New Insights for Tourism (NIT) looks into some employment trends in tourism, which has traditionally offered more low-skilled jobs and temporary contracts. The COVID pandemic caused an exodus of those people into other, more stable sectors.
However, Eurostat data show that the overall employment decrease in the tourism sector was relatively small compared to the drop in visitors’ numbers. This shows that tourism companies tried to find solutions to keep their permanent staff in the hopes of a quick end to restrictions.
We also ask some people in the street how their experiences and habits changed because of the pandemic – and the answers are surprising. From more travels closer to home and more stress because of fears of infection and rules, to those who saw the changes brought on by the pandemic as an opportunity to travel more, because of classes moving online.