ABSTRACT
On 1 May 2004, ten Central and Eastern European Countries (CEECs) acceded to the European Union (EU). The task of the coming years in these countries is to assure economic integration with the EU and the improvement of regional cohesion within and between the former and new member countries. As pointed out in Chapter 3, the Czech Republic, being one of the new member states, has an economic structure that is comparably close to the EU average concerning regional specialization indices. However, some economic indicators reveal that there is still a long way to go to reach European economic standards. In 2002, the Czech Republic produced 67 per cent of the average GVA and 61 per cent of per capita GDP in purchasing power standards of the countries of the European Monetary Union (EMU). In the same year, the compensation per employee was only 25 per cent of the EMU average while the unemployment rate in the Czech Republic was 115 per cent of the EMU average. However, compared to other new EU member countries the Czech Republic performed quite well. Only Poland produced higher values in GVA and only Slovenia and Cyprus reached higher shares in GDP per capita in PPS.1 In 2002, the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary accounted for more than three-quarters of FDI flowing to the new member countries.2
