Cyprus' media and language sector shrinks while EU expands

The number of people working as authors, journalists or linguists in the EU increased by 9.1% in 2022 compared to 2017, while in Cyprus the number of people working in this category dropped by 15.8%, according to data published by Eurostat on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day marked on May 3.

More specifically, the total number at EU level increased from about 816,800 in 2017 to 891,600 in 2022, while, in Cyprus, the number, according to available data, dropped from about 1900 in 2017 to 1600 in 2022.

Despite the fact that Eurostat’s data were published on the occasion of World Press Freedom Day, the category from which the data are drawn covers a wide range of professions, beyond those involved in the news press. The subcategory “authors” includes professions ranging from novelist to speech writer, while the subcategory “linguists” includes translators and interpreters.

This means that the trends recorded give indications as to the state regarding the press, but cannot be used to draw more specific conclusions.

The largest decrease in the number of people working in the “authors, journalists or linguists” category between 2017 and 2022 was recorded in Latvia (-35.6%), followed by Estonia (-34.3%) and Greece (-22.5%).

The highest increase during the same period was in Lithuania (+166.0%), followed by Finland (+31.5%) and Hungary (+30.8%).

The countries with the largest share of the EU people employed in these fields were Germany (25.6% of the total of those employed in this sector in the EU), France (12.0%) and Spain (9.1%). Malta, Cyprus, Latvia, Estonia and Luxembourg had less than 0.5% of the total EU share each.

When it comes to the number of enterprises publishing books and periodicals or performing other publishing activities, there were about 80,000 across the EU in 2022, having increased by 14.3% compared to 2021 (70,000 enterprises).

The lowest numbers of such enterprises were recorded in Luxembourg (79), Cyprus (93) and Malta (105), while the highest numbers were in France (23,469), Spain (5,981) and Germany (5,533).

The largest increase between 2021 and 2022 was recorded in France (+38.9%), Malta (+14.1%) and Latvia (+4.8%). Meanwhile, the largest decreases were in Luxembourg (-16.0%), Denmark (-9.0%) and Poland (-7.8%).

The number of publishing enterprises in Cyprus dropped from 94 to 93 in this period, corresponding to a reduction by 1.1%.