[DREAL OCCITANIA] Employment Areas in Occitania

An area of employment is a geographical area within which most of the workers reside and work. The division into employment zones is a partition of the territory adapted to local studies on employment and its environment, carried out jointly by INSEE and the statistical services of the Ministry of Labour. Commuting to work is the basic variable for determining this zoning. The division of employment areas in 1990 necessarily respected regional boundaries, and most often cantonal boundaries (and therefore a fortiori departmental). It was recommended not to create areas with less than 25,000 workers. There were 364 areas. The working group of the National Statistical Information Council (Cnis) on “Statistics and new trends in the localisation of populations and activities in the territory” recommended, in its report of September 2009, an update of the division of employment areas, which takes into account the latest data on population census and home migration — place of work. This update makes it possible to better identify “local labour markets”.