Instruments for the collection, processing and generation of information are becoming more and more necessary in order to direct economic and occupational promotion policies, and at the same time to answer questions posed by organisations, companies and socioeconomic agents in the process of decision making.

One of the first steps to achieve this is to make an effort to spread our knowledge of the social, economic and cultural life of the city by means of an instrument which includes all available information and allows us to provide it in a well-ordered manner.

To make use of the greater diffusion of information offered by the new communication technologies via Internet, the instrument chosen has been the website Lleida statistics. The website I present to you contains socioeconomic information about the city from 1995 to 2000, and in some cases from previous years.

Lleida statistics has based its work on the collection of relevant and reliable statistical data, with the aim of divulging them and making them into useful information. Improving and increasing this statistical base each year is a challenge for all those people who have made it possible.

I would like to thank above all the extensive participation of the organisations which generate information, which have so kindly supplied data about aspects within their field of responsibility, without which it would not have been possible to offer a statistical collection of the reality of Lleida.

I hope the information on this website which has been made available to you is of interest, and that it is of help in getting to know more things about the city.