The economic-statistical system
In order to work towards Statistics Sweden's goal of "Better coordinated economic statistics for users and simplified reporting", the upcoming changes need to be described, including when they will occur and how they will affect the statistics. Throughout the year, we will publish information about these changes, both shorter and more detailed descriptions.
New statistical enterprise units
The economic-statistical system includes new statistical enterprise units. Their purpose is to improve economic statistics and provide a better understanding of companies and their activities. To make the statistics comparable both nationally and internationally, a common definition of the units we want to report is used, which aligns with EU terminology: enterprise, kind-of-activity unit (KAU), and local kind-of-activity unit (LKAU).
Another new aspect of the economic-statistical system is called profiling. It is a method that involves mapping and describing the structures of enterprises concerning their organization and control. This applies to both the non-financial sector and the financial sector. Profiling includes both national profiling and European profiling. The result of the profiling is to describe the enterprises’ structure using the statistical units.
Why is the economic enterprice statistics changing?
Over several decades, large, often multinational, companies have increasingly developed more complex organizations for their activities, which has had consequences for the statistics. Through these changes, we can produce more relevant and higher-quality statistics.
Statistical units have been on Eurostat's agenda since 1993 when the Council regulation on statistical units was adopted. Several important developments have occurred since then, moving the work towards implementation.
To ensure that those affected by the changes receive information in a timely manner, ongoing communication takes place with relevant user councils. The consequences of the changes are also discussed in these user councils.
Statistics Sweden’s user councils
From product-centric to system-centric
The economic-statistical system is a new way to describe economic statistics from a holistic perspective that is not organizationally bound to specific departments, products or surveys within Statistics Sweden. The economic-statistical system covers the entire economic domain, including parts of the statistics that other statistical government agencies are responsible for. In this perspective, National Accounts (NA) and Balance of Payments (BoP) are the primary users of the system. This description of the economic-statistical system goes beyond the statistics covered and regulated by the EU framework European Business Statistics (EBS).
The purpose of the economic-statistical system is to produce and disseminate relevant economic statistics with sufficient quality at the lowest possible reporting cost. Statistical production should be efficient, and the statistics should meet the requirements and needs of users both internationally and nationally.
What does Eurostat say about this?
Links to Eurostat: