Metody taksonomiczne w badaniu podobieństwa województwa lubuskiego do innych regionów Unii Europejskiej
Taxonomic methods in similarity examination of Lubuskie voivodeship in comparison to other European Union regions

Summary/Abstract: In the territorial profile of the European Union, large differences may be observed betweeneconomically better and less developed regions. Therefore, in its policy, much attention is focussedon the less developed regions. Such regions include disadvantaged, remote, sparsely populated andborder regions. The Lubuskie voivodeship examined in the article should be included among them.This paper attempts to define the similarities and differences of this province in comparison toother regions of the European Union on the basis of typical features such as its geographical locationand area, population density, land use and climatic conditions. For this purpose, 266 EU regionswere studied, of which a group of 33 similar regions was identified by means of the complete linkagemethod. Next, these regions were analysed to indicate which of them, with similar geographical andnatural conditions, could constitute a model for it, achieving more favourable economic results measuredby the level of GDP per capita. The similarity between regions was examined by applying theGower distance measure for quantitative and qualitative characteristics. The test results were visualisedusing a dendrogram and a taxonomic chart of the object under study. The data for the researchwas taken from the databases of Eurostat, the European Statistical Office, and Climate-Data.org. Thecollected data define the situation in EU regions as of 2017 or the last year available.Based on the conducted research, 9 EU regions can be selected as model regions for the Lubuskievoivodeship. These are regions from the following countries: Germany (5 regions), as well asFrance, Austria, Belgium, and the Czech Republic (1 region each). More closely examining themanagement methods of the regions from the above-mentioned countries, the functioning of industry,agriculture and transport in their area, and the promotion of regionally produced products wouldbe reasonable for the needs of the regional policy of the Lubuskie voivodeship.

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