EU North-South Divide

There is a term for the poorly preforming European States- "PIGS." It stands for Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain. I used to consider these countries as a group of unfortunate nations, whose governments were forced to ask for financial assistance from the EU. After Cyprus joined this group having taken a €17 billion bailout, and the large scale media attention towards Italy's financial state I noticed how, with the exception of Ireland who has since left the bailout system, all these countries are located in Southern Europe. I feared the EU could be moving towards an economic and social divide. Courtesy of realtruth.org

After further inspection, I realized that there was definitely an economic and social divide in Europe. Most Northern European countries have a much lower rate of interest on 10 year bonds; this means the international community views Northern European Countries as more financially stable. Lower interest rates allow Northern European countries to borrow large sums of money in times of budget deficits. The Southern nations do not have such low interest rates, and cannot cover budget deficits by selling large amounts of bonds in recessionary times. This forces them to ask for financial assistance from the EU. This is a graph of interest rates for the different EU countries. Courtesy of suomenpankki.fi

It is far from just economics that are at the cause of the North-South divide in Europe. Climate, agriculture and social confidence are also deepening the divide. Southern European countries have a climate named after the Mediterranean Sea, which they all border. The average summer temperature is 30 degrees Celsius while the average summer temperature of Germany is 22.6 degrees Celsius. The difference in temperatures between the North and South affect the agriculture of the regions. Expensive irrigation schemes have been put in place to farm large areas of the South, this along with overgrazing and sudden downpours leading to erosion, can make farming in this region expensive. Southern European countries tend to grow citrus fruit, tomatoes, olives and grapes. In Northern Europe more cattle are reared and grain grown. The economic output of farmingin the South is very low. Farming in Italy, for example, only makes up 2.5 per cent of gross domestic product. The hot climate of the South also means a much lower amount of land can be put under cultivation. In Italy only 5 per cent of the land is used for farming. Courtesy of foodsfromspain.com

People of the South tend to be more outgoing, sociable and use hand gestures a lot more than Northern Europeans. Experts believe this may be solely to do with the difference in weather between the two regions. The Southerners are much more open, this maybe simply because they spend more time socializing because of the warmer weather. Southern Europeans also have an excellent work break called the "siesta," they stop work for several hours due to the warm midday weather. Due to these social differences Southern Europeans are seen as more sociable and Northerners as more work conscious. This is why many Northern Europeans, especially Germans see the bailout programme as handing cart loads of cash to the greedy, lazy Southerners.