Maltese 30 to 34-year-olds among EU's least educated

Malta has the third lowest proportion of people aged between 30 and 34 with tertiary education in the EU. Barely one in every four Maltese in that age bracket has a tertiary education, Eurostat figures show. The figure stands at 27.8 per cent.  Only Romania (25.6 per cent) and Italy (25.3 per cent) do worse than Malta.  Lithuania sits at the other end of the spectrum at 57.6 per cent followed by Cyprus (54.6 per cent), Ireland and Luxembourg (both 52.3 per cent). Twelve member states - Denmark, Estonia, Greece, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Hungary, the Netherlands, Austria, Slovenia, Finland and Sweden - have already met or exceeded their 2020 national target for this indicator. The figures show that the share of persons in this age bracket in the EU who have completed tertiary education has constantly increased, from 23.6 per cent in 2002, when the series started, to 38.7 per cent last year. This pattern was even more significant for women (from 24.5 per cent in 2002 to 43.4 per cent in 2015, meaning above the overall Europe 2020 target) than for men (from 22.6 per cent to 34 per cent meaning still below the overall Europe 2020 target). The Europe 2020 strategy’s target is that...