Eurobarometer: EU citizens remain strongly in favour of Ukraine and of ensuring energy security

This article is brought to you in association with the European Commission.

The latest Standard Eurobarometer survey published today, almost one year after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, shows continued strong solidarity of Europeans with Ukraine and their support for the actions undertaken to support the country and its people.

EU citizens also overwhelmingly support the acceleration of the energy transition, notably investments in renewable energy and actions to reduce the EU’s dependency on Russian energy sources.

While inflation is still a major concern for Europeans, support for the euro remains very high.

A strong backing for the EU’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine

EU citizens continue to show their unwavering solidarity with Ukraine. 91% of respondents agree with the provision of humanitarian support and 88% are in favour of welcoming into the EU people fleeing the war. Providing financial support to Ukraine is approved by 77%, while imposing economic sanctions on Russian government, companies and individuals gain the support of 74% of the interviewees. Europeans also continue to be largely in favour of banning Russian state-owned media from broadcasting (67%) and of the EU financing the purchase and supply of military equipment to Ukraine (65%).

Overall, a majority of European citizens (56%) remain satisfied with the European Union’s response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

77% of EU respondents are in favour of a common defence and security policy among EU Member States, the same proportion as last summer, while 16% are against. In addition, 80% think that Member States’ purchase of military equipment should be better coordinated and 69% believe that the EU needs to reinforce its capacity to produce military equipment.

An overwhelming support for the energy transition

A great majority of EU citizens (84%) agree that the EU should reduce its dependency on Russian sources of energy as soon as possible. They also overwhelmingly agree that EU should support the green transition by investing massively in renewable energies (86%). 85% of Europeans are convinced that increasing energy efficiency of buildings, transport and goods will make us less dependent on energy producers outside the EU. 82% agree that EU Member States should jointly buy energy from other countries to get a better price. In addition, 81% say that they have taken action to reduce their own energy consumption.

Worries about inflation and the economy but strong support for the euro

EU citizens consider rising prices/inflation/cost of living as one of the two most important issues facing the EU at the moment (32%, -2 pp), followed by the international situation (28%, stable), and energy supply (26%, -2 pp).

Perception of the situation of the European economy has remained unchanged since summer 2022, with 40% assessing it as ‘good’ and 51% as ‘bad’. Perception of the situation of the national economy has also remained relatively stable since summer 2022, with now 35% judging it is good and 63% thinking it is bad.

In this context, support for the euro remains at a very high level in the EU as a whole (71%, the second highest level ever recorded), and even more in the euro area (79%).

In addition, more than half of the respondents (54%) think that the NextGenerationEU recovery plan can be effective to respond to the current economic challenges. 63% also believe that public money should be used to stimulate private sector investment at EU level.

Europeans remain optimistic about the future of the EU

47% of Europeans tend to trust EU and 32% tend to trust national governments. 45% of Europeans have a positive image of the EU, 36% a neutral image and 18% a negative image. Finally, 62% say they are optimistic about the future of the EU (-3 pp compared to summer 2022 but similar to the level recorded in February 2022, before Russia’s aggression against Ukraine).

Background

The “Winter 2022-2023 – Standard Eurobarometer” (EB 98) was conducted through face-to-face and online interviews between 12 January and 6 February 2023. 26,468 EU citizens were interviewed across the 27 Member States. Information about Eurobarometer and all surveys are available on the website.