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How Bulgaria, Romania Change EU

Bulgaria and Romania's entry into the European Union in January 2007 will have a far smaller impact on the bloc than the "big bang" enlargement of May 2004, when ten countries joined.

The current EU25 member states are: Austria, Belgium, Britain, Czech Republic, Cyprus, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden.

POPULATION

Based on figures from 2004, the EU at 27 will have a population of nearly 487 million compared to 457 million now; third in world terms behind China and India. Germany will remain the most populous member state with 82.5 million people, while Malta stays at the foot of the table with some 400,000 people.

SURFACE AREA

The surface of the EU expands to around 4.2 million square kilometres (1.62 million square miles) compared to 3.9 million square kilometres (1.51 million square miles) currently.

LANGUAGES

Romanian and Bulgarian will bring the number of official EU languages to 22. The other 20 are: Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Lithuanian, Latvian, Maltese, Polish, Portuguese, Slovakian, Slovenian, Spanish and Swedish.

RELIGION

The EU will remain predominantly Christian - Roman Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox - with a sizeable Muslim minority. Bulgaria's Muslim minority, around 800,000 people, will become one of the biggest in the EU. France is estimated to have between four and five million Muslims, while Muslims in Germany number around three million.

ECONOMY

Living standards in the two candidates are lower than in the poorest EU members. In Bulgaria, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita was EUR 6,300 (USD 8,052) in 2004; just 30.8% of the EU average.
In Romania, GDP per capita stood at EUR 7,000 (USD 8,947), or 31.4% of the EU average. However economic growth in the two Balkans states was higher than in the Union. The EU 25's GDP grew by 1.6% in 2005.
Romania's economy grew by 4.1% last year and Bulgaria's grew by 5.5%.

DEMOGRAPHICS

Bulgarians and Romanians have similar life expectancies: 68.5 years and 67.6 years respectively for men, and 75.3 years and 74.82 years for women. But the EU average remains higher - 74.8 years for men and 81.1 years for women.