14/03/2002 (Agence Europe) - Two reports on research and development (R&D) in the EU, published on Wednesday by Eurostat, reveal that, on average, the share of R&D spending in GDP stood at 1.87% in the EU in 1998. The four most active regions in this field are all situated in Germany (Braunschweig, Stuttgart, Oberbayern, Tübingen), and all allocate over 4% of their GDP to R&D spending. In absolute value, the Ile de France, which devoted EUR 13.4 billion to R&D spending in 1999, was the leading EU region and, alone, accounted for nearly 9% of total EU spending. On the whole, R&D spending has been very concentrated since then as, in 1997, 28 regions out of 211 account for 50% of all spending.