engleski

New Regionalization of Adriatic Croatia

Adriatic Croatia, as well as Eastern (Pannonian) and North-Western Croatia, has been one of three defined (future) Euroregions NUTS-2 in Croatia. In its recent territorial coverage it was suggested by the Republic of Croatia and accepted by Eurostat in 2007. It includes littoral (6) and mountainous (1) counties (županija) of Croatia, covering 26.7 thousand km2 with 1.4 million inhabitants (2011). The paper discusses a possible differentiation of this strategic littoral Adriatic area on three functional (gravitation) regions, of the third level (NUTS-3) according to the criteria of the Croatian Government on efficacious decentralisation and new regionalisation of Croatia. Namely, all littoral and mountainous counties do not satisfy demographic criteria for statistical NUTS-3 region (150-800 thousand inhabitants). That is why the author, applying demographic, geographic, economic, administrative and other criteria, stresses the need of defining, as much as possible harmonised, three nodal-functional, i.e. gravitational regions with their centres in Rijeka, Zadar and Split. So, the Rijeka region would potentially cover Istria, Kvarner and Gorski Kotar areas with 505 000 inhabitants (2011.), Zadar region would cover North Dalmatian and Lika areas with 330 000 inhabitants, and Split region would include Middle Dalmatian and Dubrovnik (South Dalmatian) areas with 578 000 residents. Singling out the whole vernacular region Dalmatia in NUTS-3 region in this way is not possible as it surpasses 800 thousand inhabitants. That is why the organising two regions is practicaly indispensable. Considering the relatively small number of inhabitants in Rijeka region and Lika, Dalmatia has been incorporated in NUTS 2 region, i.e. common regional complex of Adriatic Croatia. The Lika area is functionally and economicaly most optimally oriented towards Zadar, taking in consideration new processes of highway connecting and recently fast development of Zadar.

Regionalization; Croatia; NUTS regions

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