Head of National Accounts Statistics Netherlands Dealing with External Challenges in the Compilation of National Accounts: The Dutch Response Peter van de Ven Head of National Accounts Statistics Netherlands

Major External Developments Ongoing Budgetary Cutbacks 30% since 1999 Pressure to Decrease Respondent Burden 60% in the period 1994-2002 25% in the period 2002-2006 Ongoing Demands Growing Availability of Register Data Legal obligation (2004): no surveys possible if register data is available Free access to administrations Legal possiblities to match data files

Major External Developments Globalisation Inconsistencies between statistics Delineation of national economy Growing Mobility of Personnel Transparency and Reproducibility Growing IT-possibilities User Demands Focus on short term statistics Multi-dimensional policy issues Quickly changing needs for information Growing administrative use of NA-data

Redesign of Economic Statistics Integrated architecture + chain management: clearly defined ”resting points” in processing of data, from Business Register to NA Production Statistics: Mainly driven by administrative registers (VAT-register and Register on employment and wages) => Note: Observation unit and matching Restricted surveying of additional data: Very limited annual survey (10-20 questions?) Rolling review of input structure (once every 3-5 years?) ProdCom

Redesign of Economic Statistics Separate processing of large and/or complex enterprises (250-500 enterprises?) Integrated compilation of Structural Business Statistics (SBS) and Supply and Use Tables (SUT), based on: Before-mentioned data Data on government and financial corporations Data on imports and final uses

Redesign of NA (General Issues) NA: clearly defined set of tasks based on ”resting points” Translation to NA-concepts Exhaustiveness Integration of source data Three (more internally oriented) projects: Less Detailed SUT: from 260 * 850 => 150 * 500 Dashboard ”Quarter-machine”

Redesign of NA (Dashboard) Software system for prioritising inconsistencies and implausibilities Based on predefined set of norms and standards After solving major inconsistencies: automatic balancing Goal: more top-down, less bottom-up; more efficient processing At the moment: iterative process of implementation

Redesign of NA (Quarter-machine) Software system for: Benchmarking quarterly data to annual data Compiling annual estimates, based on quarterly NA-data plus newly available source data Use of Denton Techniques Relevant for the whole core-system of NA: SUT, Institutional Sector Accounts (ISA) and Labour Accounts (LA) Complete change in focus, from annual to quarterly data

Revision policy: now versus future Present revision policy: T+45 days: flash quarterly economic growth and employment T+90 days: (revised) quarterly estimates for SUT, ISA and LA ---------------------------------------------------------------------- T+6 months: 1st provisional (autonomous) annual estimate T+18 months: 2nd provisional (autonomous) annual estimate T+30 months: definite (autonomous) annual estimate

Revision policy: now versus future Future revision policy: T+45 days: flash quarterly economic growth and employment T+90 days: (revised) quarterly estimates for SUT, ISA and LA T+6 months: 1st annual estimate based on sum of 4 quarters plus newly available source data T+18 months: 2nd annual estimate based on sum of 4 quarters plus newly available source data ---------------------------------------------------------------------- T+30 months: definite (autonomous) annual estimate

Redesign (of NA): main goals More efficient system Less respondent burden More transparent and reproducible system Better quality, or at least no loss of quality: Consistent recording of large enterprises Full exploitation of register data More top-down, less bottom-up Improved ability to cope with mobility of personnel Note: still a lot of work and problems ahead!

Some concluding remarks More international co-operation: Exchange of best practices Development of software tools for NA-compilation ...