According to data from the official EU statistics office, last year more than 11.4 million bicycles were produced in the EU, representing an increase of five percent over the previous year, but still below the ‘peak’ recorded in 2015, of 13.7 million.

Eurostat points out that in 2019, five Member States were responsible for 70 percent of the total production of bicycles in the EU, with Portugal standing out at the top, with 2.7 million bicycles, ahead of the 2018 ‘champion’ of production, Italy ( 2.1 million), Germany (1.5 million), Poland (900,000) and Holland (700,000).

Eurostat data reveals that Portugal registered a sharp increase between 2018 and 2019, with 736,000 more bicycles produced (in 2018 it had produced 1.9 million), which allowed it to overtake Italy and move into first position on the table.