1. Gross Fixed Capital Formation
Concepts
Total value of acquisitions, less disposals, of fixed assets during the accounting period, plus certain additions to the value of non-produced assets owing to the productive activity of institutional units.
Fixed assets are tangible or intangible assets which are produced as outputs from production processes and which are themselves used repeatedly or continuously in other production processes for more than one year.

2. Tangible Fixed Assets
Acquisitions, less disposals, of new and existing tangible fixed assets, sub-divided by type of asset into:
Dwellings;
Other buildings and structures;
Machinery and equipment;
Cultivated assets – trees and livestock - that are used repeatedly or continuously to obtain products such as fruit, rubber, milk, etc.

3. Intangible Fixed Assets
Aquisitions, less disposals of new or existing intangible fixed assets, sub-divided by type of asset into:
Mineral exploration;
Software;
Entertainment, literary or artistic originals;
Other intangible fixed assets.

4. Others
Major improvements to non-produced tangible assets, including land.
Costs of transfers of ownership of produced and non-produced assets.

5. Gross Fixed Capital Formation Business and Government
Three main categories:
Residential Construction
Non-Residential Construction
Machinery and Equipment

6. Business Residential Construction
Millions of dollars
2003
2004
2005
2006
New Construction
36724
42136
43927
47652
Alterations and Improvements
24209
27100
30270
33631
Transfer Costs
11781
13682
15594
17103
Total
72714
82918
89791
98386

7. New Residential Construction
Singles, doubles, rows and apartments – (Work-put-in-place)
housing starts – Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation ( CMHC )
average value of building permits – Building Permits Survey
work put in place coefficients

8. Other New Construction
Cottages, mobile homes and conversions
Building Permits Survey
Supplementary costs
Goods and services Tax
Provincial Sales Tax
Land developer fees
Other supplementary costs
Data published on a monthly basis by Investment and Capital Stock Division ( ICSD)

9. Alterations and Improvements
Included are all works that improve the quality of the dwelling and extend its service life
e.g. - replacement of carpets
- replacement of roof
- installation of fixed electrical home appliances
Repair work is recorded in personal consumer expenditures under services.

10. Alterations and Improvements (Annual Estimates)
National and provincial annual estimates
Renovation expenditures undertaken by:
Owner – occupants
Landlords
Cottage owners
Renters
Survey of Household Spending –SHS
Homeowners Repairs and Renovations Survey - HRRS

11. FAMEX /SHS – Family Expenditure Survey or Survey of Household Spending
HRRS – Homeowners Repair and Renovations Survey (discontinued in 2002)
IEAD – SNA estimate

12. Alterations and Improvements (Quarterly Sources)
Building permits for renovations (source: ICSD )
Sales of building materials such as
building supplies,
metal products,
lumber and millwork.
( source: Wholesale Trade Survey )
And information for home furniture stores, home centres and hardware stores and other building material and garden equipment dealers. (source: Retail Trade Survey )

13. Ownership Transfer Costs
Annual sources of data:
Real Estate Agents and Brokers Survey
Multiple Listing Service – MLS
Survey of Household Spending – SHS
Quarterly source
the number of units sold and
the average sale price.

14. Deflation New residential construction
New House Price Index – NHPI excluding land (Prices Division)
Single family dwellings
Semi-detached dwellings
Row houses
Apartment Building Construction Price Index
Apartments

15. Deflation Alterations and Improvements:
Renovations Price Index (estimated in IEAD)
Cost of Labour ( 60% ) ( Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours)
Cost of Materials ( 40% ) ( Materials by type such as lumber, pipes, etc. )
Transfer Costs
Indexed average selling price of existing homes sold from Multiple Listing Services (MLS)

16. Non-Residential Construction
New non-residential construction (work put in place)
Additions and major renovations
Conversions and alterations that extend the life of an existing asset
Transfer costs
Capitalized costs (architectural, legal and engineering fees and interest)

17. Total Non-residential Construction
Millions of Dollars
2003
2004
2005
2006
Buildings
27237
29867
32388
35914
Engineering
47029
53477
65175
78056
Highways
7303
7693
9283
10650
Railways
905
970
1172
1338
Other engineering
38821
44814
54720
66068
Total
74266
83344
97563
113970

18. Business & Public Administrations
Two categories
Building construction
e.g. hotels, office buildings, railway stations, schools and shopping centres
Engineering construction
e.g. bridges, roads, highways, waterworks, sewage systems, airports, transmission lines, oil well drilling, mine development, railway tracks, etc.

19. Sources of Data Annual sources of data Input/Output tables
Capital Expenditure Survey (CES), Actual, Preliminary and Intentions Estimates
Quarterly projectors and related indicators
Quarterly sources of data
There is no quarterly survey.
Related indicators are used to measure non-residential construction for the current year.

20. Global Approach
Total Construction Activity is obtained by combining data on:
Material costs (shipments - exports + imports + ∆ inventories)
+ Labour costs (employment, hours and average earnings)
+ Overhead costs and profits
= Total value of construction activity
- Estimates of residential construction (New Construction, A&I)
+ Value added in oil and gas drilling
= Value of spending on non-residential construction

21. Non Residential Construction
Resulting estimates are compared with annual estimates from the Capital Expenditure Survey and the survey by asset type
Quarterly estimates are benchmarked during the annual revision cycle
Annual estimates reflect the most recent data from Input-Output tables

22. Detailed approaches I. Buildings:
Institutional, industrial and commercial non-residential construction (ICSD) based on monthly building permit values and monthly work put in place (WPIP) coefficients
The monthly Building Permits Survey of Canadian municipalities collects data on the value of construction intentions for buildings in the non-residential sector and the number of dwellings authorized and value of construction projects in the residential sector.
The WPIP coefficients measure, by quarter of start, by province and by type of building, the volume of work normally executed in each construction period.

23. Detailed Approaches II. Engineering: Highways:
Material costs based on asphalt sales in cubic metres * Industry Product Price Index (IPPI) for asphalt
Labour costs (SEPH)
Railways:
Material costs (e.g. ties, sand, stone, steel, etc.)

24. Detailed Approaches Other engineering Material costs
iron and steel pipes, other metal building products, wires and cables, concrete products, prefabricated metal structures, glass products, etc.
Labour costs based on estimates of
Hours
Average weekly earnings
Number of employees.
Information based on Labour Force Survey ( LFS ) and Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours ( SEPH )

25. Non Residential Construction
Other information used:
Construction estimates reported in the Quarterly Survey of Financial Statistics for Enterprises (large companies in mining, telecommunications, railways…etc.)
Capital spending by provincial electric utilities – Public Institutions Division
Cubic metres drilled in the oil and gas industry – Industry Accounts Division – Monthly GDP
Department of Natural Resources (general exploration expenditures )

26. Deflation Buildings
Non-Residential Building Construction Price Indexes (commercial, industrial and institutional) – Prices Division
The Non-residential Building Construction Price Index (NRBCPI) is a quarterly series measuring the changes in contractors' selling prices of non-residential building construction (i.e. commercial, industrial and institutional)

27. Deflation Engineering
In the absence of output price indexes – Input price indexes are constructed in IEAD:
Material costs:
IPPI for prefabricated metal building and structure, line pipe, other insulated wires and cables, concrete basic products, sand, stone, ready-mix concrete, etc.
Labour costs:
Average weekly earnings (SEPH)
Overhead costs:
Average weekly earnings indexes and consumer price indexes

28. Machinery and Equipment
Spending on durable and tangible goods that have a productive life of one year or more (whether owned or leased) including:
purchase, construction and installation costs
feasibility studies, tooling, progress payments
exploration and development costs
net portion of used assets

29. Business Machinery and Equipment
2003
2004
2005
2006
Furniture
4046
4557
4882
5348
Agricultural Machinery
2972
2938
3108
2644
Industrial Machinery
20357
21606
23974
25128
Computers
8223
9315
9632
10072
Software
10806
11000
11364
12053
Automobiles
6465
6216
6353
6620
Trucks
11337
12110
13140
13679
Other transportation
5089
5338
6780
6532
Telecommunication
6189
5979
5728
5926
Other
5347
5376
5648
5797
Total
80831
84435
90609
93801

30. Sources of Data (Annual)
Benchmark data are from the final demand matrix of the Input-Output tables (IOT).
Current estimates are based on the Capital Expenditures Survey Actual, Preliminary and Intentions of Investment and Capital Stock Division and
The sum of the quarterly estimates coming from a Supply Disposition approach.

31. Sources of Data (Quarterly)
Supply / Disposition model:
GFME = GO + M – X + change in inventories, where
GO - gross output estimated using shipments
M - imports from International Trade Division
X - exports from International Trade Division
Done at a very detailed level (39 groups), such as for
Telecommunication equipment
Telephone and related equipment including facsimile
Broadcasting and radio communication equipment
Radar & radio navigation equipment
( Re. Supply/disposition models sent to the NBS on March 2007 )

32. Sources of Data (Quarterly)
Industrial machinery
Machine tools
Conveyors, elevators & hoisting machinery
Packaging and bottling machinery
Construction & mining machinery
Logging, pulp & paper industry machinery
Power generation & marine prop., non-electric
Electrical generators & motors

33. Sources of Data (Quarterly)
Other transportation equipment
Aircraft
Commercial trailers & semi-trailers
Truck & bus bodies & cargo containers
Locomotive, railway & urban trans. rolling stock
Ships, boats & parts, excl. pleasure
And other groups

34. Investment in Cars and Trucks
A more direct approach is used to estimate investment in cars and trucks:
Total sales by type from Survey of New Motor Vehicle Sales
Government and business shares based on data from Motor Vehicles Manufacturers Association.

35. Software Investment Own account software Pre-packaged software
Custom-design software
Own-account software ( software developed by in-house employees to meet specific organization needs ) is based on the labour costs of computer programmers and system analysts and other costs (non-salary) of in-house software development.
Investment in pre-packaged and custom-design software is estimated residually (domestic production, plus imports, plus margins, less exports, less personal expenditure).

36. Deflation
Machinery and equipment price indexes (MEPIs) are used for all commodities except computers and software. The MEPI tracks price movements on a domestic and imported basis (producer price indexes published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics are used for the import component).
The Machinery and Equipment Price Index (MEPI) provides quarterly estimates of price changes for machinery and equipment purchases, relative to annual gross additions to capital by Canadian Industry of purchase.

37. Deflation
The deflator for computers is a weighted average of import and export computer price indexes.
Own-account software is deflated using a fixed weighted average of hourly earnings of programmers and systems analysts and an index of costs of non-labour inputs.
The Commercial Software Price Index from Prices Division is used to deflate pre-packaged software.
Custom-design software is deflated using a weighted average of the pre-packaged and own-account price indexes.

38. Total Investment on Plant and Equipment, 2005