EN Official Journal of the European Union CE 78/393

(2004/C 78 E/0416)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1882/03

by Christopher Huhne (ELDR) to the Commission

(6 June 2003)

Subject: Trade impact of euro

Will the Commission state the proportion of GDP of each Member State traded with euro and non-euro EU Member States in each year for the last five years? Will it give the figures using trade in goods, trade in services and trade in goods and services? Will it further as a memo item give the figure for investment income broken down in the same way?

Answer given by Mr Bolkestein on behalf of the Commission

(17 July 2003)

Table 1 (a, b) presents each Member State's share of total imports and exports of goods as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP); this is sent direct to the Honourable Member and to the Parliament's Secretariat. In particular, figures for each individual Member State distinguish between trade with eurozone, and trade with non-eurozone Member States respectively. Note that this trade data has been obtained from Trade Statistics of New Cronos (Eurostat), where imports are calculated using c.i.f. (cost, insurance & freight) values, i.e. figures are inclusive of transport and insurance costs.

Balance of payments statistics are the only sources available for trade in services and income investment figures, and are an alternative source for trade in goods. For goods and services, as stated in the reply by the Commission to the Honourable Member's written questions E-2464/02 (1), E-2465/02 (2) and E-1349/03 (3), the data provided by Member States to the Commission (Eurostat) to compile the Balance of Payments of the Union are based on a different methodology (principle of consignment) from that used by Member States for compiling and publishing their national Balance of Payments (principle of origin). In response to question E-1349/03, the Commission provided information on exports and imports of services between each Member State and the EU15, including bilateral details for those countries for which this information was available. EU15 aggregates are reproduced here in table 2 (a-d), sent direct to the Honourable Member and to the Parliament's Secretariat. Regarding investment income, due to the difficulties faced by Member States to correctly identify the residency of the holder of the securities, it may not be possible to compile the corresponding payments providing a geographical breakdown (4).

The European Central Bank (ECB) is responsible for producing and publishing aggregated balance of payments figures for the eurozone. Euro area Member States transmit data on the contributions of the euro area balance of payments to the ECB [i.e. extra euro area flows, as regards goods, services and investment income], under the agreement that only the euro area aggregate would be made available to the public. Indeed, these are the only meaningful figures for policy purposes. Methodological differences do not allow us to produce eurozone (and EU non-eurozone) aggregates comparable to ECB aggregates.

As regards trade plus services data, information from tables 1 and 2 cannot be added because table 1 includes c.i.f. data, and therefore addition would imply double counting of those costs.

(1) OJ C 28 E, 6.2.2003.

(2) OJ C 28 E, 6.2.2003.

(3) OJ C 268 E, 7.11.2003, p. 188.

(4) For further details see ECB Monthly Bulletin — euro area statistics, Methodological Notes, Chapter 8, page 4, http://www.ecb.int/stats/mb/ecb_bull_8note.pdf