REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL on the implementation of Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 58/97 and of the Regulation (EC) No 295/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning structural business statistics (recast) which repealed and replaced Regulation No 58/97
Date: 2011-05-04
Institutions: European Commission
Subjects: EU statistics, branch of activity, company structure, competitiveness, economic statistics, statistical method

EN 

EN 

   EN 

 
EUROPEAN COMMISSION 

Brussels, 4.5.2011 
COM(2011) 242 final 

REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND 
THE COUNCIL  

on the implementation of Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 58/97 and of the 
Regulation (EC) No 295/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning 
structural business statistics (recast) which repealed and replaced Regulation No 58/97 

EN 

   EN 

 
 
  
REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND 
THE COUNCIL  

on the implementation of Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 58/97 and of the 
Regulation (EC) No 295/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council concerning 
structural business statistics (recast) which repealed and replaced Regulation No 58/97 

TABLE OF CONTENTS 

1. 

2. 

3. 

3.1. 

3.2. 

3.3. 

3.4. 

3.5. 

4. 

5. 

5.1. 

5.2. 

6. 

INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................ 3 

REGULATORY DEVELOPMENTS.......................................................................... 3 

AVAILABILITY AND QUALITY OF STRUCTURAL BUSINESS STATISTICS 
DATA........................................................................................................................... 4 

Main data sets............................................................................................................... 4 

Timeliness, accessibility and relevance of data sets .................................................... 5 

Confidentiality rules and implementation.................................................................... 8 

Accuracy ...................................................................................................................... 8 

Coherence and comparability....................................................................................... 9 

COMPLIANCE WITH THE STRUCTURAL BUSINESS STATISTICS (SBS) 
REGULATION .......................................................................................................... 10 

THE BURDEN ON BUSINESSES AND ACTION TO REDUCE IT ..................... 12 

Introduction ................................................................................................................ 12 

Actions taken to reduce the burden............................................................................ 12 

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT ................................................................................... 13 

EN 

2 

   EN 

1. 

 INTRODUCTION 

The  objective  of  Council  Regulation  No  58/97  "(hereinafter  referred  to  as  "Regulation  No 
58/97"  or  "the  SBS  Regulation"),  as  set  out  in  its  Article  1,  is  to  establish  a  common 
framework  for  the  collection,  compilation,  transmission  and  evaluation  of  Community 
statistics  on  the  structure,  activity,  competitiveness  and  performance  of  business  in  the 
Community. The  SBS  Regulation lays down the norms, standards and definitions  necessary 
for producing comparable Community statistics. 

This  report  covers  the  implementation  of  Regulation  No  58/97.  It  should  be  noted  that 
Regulation  No  58/97  was  repealed  and  replaced  by  Regulation  (EC)  No  295/2008  of  the 
European  Parliament  and  of  the  Council  concerning  structural  business  statistics  (recast) 
(hereinafter referred to as "Regulation No 295/2008"). 

The report has been prepared partly under the provisions of Article  14(1) of Regulation No 
58/97 as regards final data for reference year 2007 and partly under the provisions of Article 
13(1) of Regulation No 295/2008 as regards preliminary data for reference year 2008. 

The  reason  for  preparing  the  report  as  such  was  the  fact  that  the  first  complete  data  sets 
covering  all  Annexes  of  Regulation  No  295/2008  for  reference  year  2008  data  will  not  be 
validated  until  early  2011,  which  is  too  late  for  providing  a  report  within  the  time  limits 
stipulated by Regulation No 295/2008, hence the partial reporting under the two Regulations. 

Generally,  the  aim  of  the  report  is  to  provide  information  on  the  actions  undertaken  by  the 
European Commission to ensure that high quality European structural business statistics are 
made  available  to  users,  and  also  on  the  manner  and  extent  to  which  each  of  the  Member 
States  has  implemented  the  SBS  Regulations.  Moreover,  it  provides  information  on  the 
burden on businesses and the actions taken by Member States in order to reduce that burden. 

2. 

REGULATORY DEVELOPMENTS 

Since the previous report produced in 2007, the SBS Regulation was repealed in 2008, with 
the adoption of Regulation No 295/2008 of the European Parliament and the Council on 11 
March 2008. Due to the fact that several amendments had been made to Regulation No 58/97 
in the past, and further amendments were scheduled to be integrated, the « recast » option was 
preferred for reasons of clarity.  

The  main  objectives  of  the  regulation  were  to  respond  to  the  increased  need  for  statistical 
data,  in  particular  for  services,  and  to  simplify  and  to  lessen  the  amount  of  required  data 
wherever possible. 

Two new annexes were added to Regulation No 295/2008 (Annex VIII - Structural Statistics 
on Business services and Annex IX - Structural Statistics on Business demography) and the 
data requirements for the services sector were reinforced. 

Also,  a  flexible  module  for  conducting  a  specific  and  limited  ad-hoc  data  collection  of 
enterprise characteristics was added. It was decided that the first use of the flexible module of 
the SBS recast was to be for a data collection on "Access to Finance". The results of this data 
collection are expected in 2011. 

EN 

3 

   EN 

Some  simplifications  were  also  introduced;  a  number  of  mandatory  and  optional  variables 
were  deleted  and  the  frequency  of  data  collection  for  some  variables  was  changed  from 
annual to multi-annual. 

The present report covers the seven annexes of Regulation No 58/97, which can also be found 
in Regulation No 295/2008 under the same headings. 

Annex I 

Common Module for Annual Structural Statistics  

Annex II 

Structural Statistics in Industry 

Annex III 

Structural Statistics in Trade  

Annex IV 

Structural Statistics in Construction 

Annex V 

Structural Statistics in Insurance 

Annex VI 

Structural Statistics on Credit institutions 

Annex VII 

Structural Statistics on Pension funds 

In  accordance  with  Article  12  of  the  Regulation  No  58/97  (Article  11  of  Regulation  No 
295/2008  of  the  European  Parliament  and  the  Council),  Commission  Regulation  (EC)  No 
1618/1999 (Commission Regulation (EU) No 275/2010) provide the criteria for the evaluation 
of the quality of structural business statistics. 

3. 

AVAILABILITY  AND  QUALITY  OF 
STATISTICS DATA  

STRUCTURAL  BUSINESS 

3.1.  Main data sets 

Structural Business Statistics data give a comprehensive picture of the structure, development 
and characteristics of European business and its various activities. Broadly speaking, the data 
cover all market activities except agriculture and personal services. 

The main characteristics (variables) covered by the SBS data are: 

•  Business Demographic variables (e.g. Number of enterprises); 
•  “Output related” variables (e.g. Turnover, Value added); 
•  “Input  related”  variables:  labour  input  (e.g.  Employment,  Hours  worked);  goods  and 
services input (e.g. Total of purchases); capital input (e.g. Investments in tangible goods). 

•  Several important derived indicators are generated in the form of ratios of certain monetary 

characteristics or per capita values.  

Several  data  sets  are  transmitted  by  all  Member  States  according  to  the  requirements  laid 
down in Commission Regulation No 251/20091 and the main series are those classified as:  

•  Annual enterprise statistics; 

1 

Commission Regulation (EC) No 251/2009 of 11 March 2009 implementing and amending Regulation 
(EC)  No  295/2008  of  the  European  Parliament  and  of  the  Council  as  regards  the  series  of  data  to  be 
produced  for  structural  business  statistics  and  the  adaptations  necessary  after  the  revision  of  the 
statistical classification of products by activity (CPA) 

EN 

4 

   EN 

                                                 
•  Annual enterprise statistics broken down by size class; 
•  Annual regional statistics. 

•  On the Annual enterprise statistics series all characteristics are published by country and 

detailed at the class level (4 digits) of NACE Rev. 1.1. 

Annual  enterprise  statistics  broken  down  by  size  class.  All  characteristics  are  published  by 
country,  detailed  down  to  the  NACE  Rev.  1.1.-  group  level  (3  digits)  and  employment  size 
class.  For  distributive  trades'  activities,  an  additional  supplementary  breakdown  by  turnover 
size class is available. 

On the Annual regional statistics series, four characteristics are published by NUTS-2 region2 
and detailed at division level (2 digits) of NACE Rev.1.1. For the distributive trades section, 
data are published at group level (3 digits) of NACE Rev. 1.1. 

Data requested from the 2008 reference year onwards will be made available on the Eurostat 
website with the new codes for the classification of activities (NACE Rev.2). 

Most of the SBS data are collected by the National Statistical Institutes (NSIs) by means of 
statistical  surveys  or  business  register  surveys,  or  from  various  administrative  sources.  The 
NSIs  can  use  one  or  more  of  these  sources,  according  to  their  survey  strategy,  taking  into 
account  the  costs,  the  quality  of  data  and  the  response  burden  on  enterprises.  At  Eurostat 
level, all data received from the Member States are checked from the point of view of quality 
and are published on Eurostat’s website.  

3.2. 

Timeliness, accessibility and relevance of data sets  

3.2.1. Timeliness of data sets 

The  transmission  deadlines  (expressed  in  months,  after  the  end  of  the  reference  year)  for 
providing data to Eurostat are:  
•  T+10 for preliminary data on Annexes I to IV; 
•  T+10 for Annex VI; 
•  T+12 for Annexes V and VII. 
•  T+18 for final data on Annexes I to IV; 
3.2.2. Accessibility of the released SBS data 
All  data  are  available  free  of  charge  on  the  Eurostat's  website3  under  the  theme  "Industry, 
trade and services".  

Definitive 2007 data for Annexes V to VII were released on Eurostat's website in May 2009 
and for Annexes I to IV in November 2009. 

EU aggregates for definitive 2007 data have been calculated on the basis of the available data 
provided by Member States and, in the case of missing data, on the basis of estimates. Non-
confidential EU aggregates were released in early 2010.  

Preliminary  2008  data  for  Annexes  I  to  IV  in  NACE  Rev.2  were  released  on  Eurostat's 
website in January 2010 for most of the countries.  

2 
3 

Common classification of territorial units for statistics (Regulation (EC) No 1059/2003) 
http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/eurostat/home 

EN 

5 

   EN 

                                                 
3.2.2.1. Publications programme for 2009 

In addition to their dissemination on Eurostat's website, the results were also presented in a 
number of publications, including: one Panorama publication "European Business: Facts and 
figures",  ten  issues  of  Statistics  in  Focus  and  a  new  restructured  dedicated  section  on 
European business on Eurostat's website. 

SBS data were also used in many other publications. Major contributions were made during 
2009, in particular to the Eurostat yearbook, Eurostat pocketbook and Regional yearbook.  

Moreover, beginning in mid 2009, a new tool (Statistics Explained4) for the dissemination of 
(meta-) data via Eurostat’s website was developed. Statistics Explained is based on Web 2.0 
Wiki-type  technology  and  its  main  purpose  is  to  explain  European  statistics,  by  presenting 
data  and  pointing  out  what  is  interesting  or  surprising  about  them,  with  all  necessary 
background information.  

3.2.3. Effectiveness of the Regulation and relevance of data sets: completeness 

In  very  broad  terms  it  can  be  concluded  from  Tables  1,  2  and  3  that  data  transmitted  by 
Member States are reasonably complete for Annexes I to IV, but the availability of data for 
the annexes covering the financial sectors (Annexes V to VII) is in general much lower. 

Also, from the figures presented in the tables below, it can be observed that the availability of 
data on Eurostat's website was reduced by the presence of confidential data, especially for the 
small countries as regards definitive data on Annexes I to IV.  

A high level of availability and a low level of confidentiality were recorded for preliminary 
2008 data on Annexes I to IV, since those data are requested only at the three-digit level of 
NACE Rev.2. 

Table 1. Availability and confidentiality of final 2007 data for Annexes I to IV, NACE 
Rev.1.1 

Countries5 

Large countries 
Medium countries 
Small countries  
ALL 

Total transmitted cells in % of 
required by SBS Regulation  

94 
92 
86 
90 

Confidential cells in % of 
transmitted cells 
13 
22 
26 
22 

4 
5 

http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/statistics_explained/index.php/Structural_business_statistics_overview 
5 CETO flags classification :  

Large countries: DE, FR, IT, UK 
Medium countries: BE, DK, ES, GR, IE, NL, AT, PL, PT, FI, SE, NO 
Small countries: BG, CZ, EE, CY, LV, LT, LU HU, MT, RO, SI, SK 

EN 

6 

   EN 

 
                                                 
Table 2. Availability and confidentiality of final 2007 data for Annexes V to VII, NACE 
Rev.1.1 

Countries 

Large countries 
Medium countries 
Small countries  
ALL 

Total transmitted cells in % of 
required by SBS Regulation  

Confidential cells in % of 
transmitted cells 

63 
78 
70 
73 

9 
11 
6 
9 

Table 3. Availability  and confidentiality  of preliminary 2008 data for Annexes I to IV, 
NACE Rev.2 

Countries 

Large countries 
Medium countries 
Small countries  
ALL 

Total transmitted cells in % of 
required by SBS Regulation  

Confidential cells in % of 
transmitted cells 

99 
95 
91 
94 

5 
16 
14 
13 

3.2.3.1. Relevance to users 

An  indicator  of  the  relevance  of  the  SBS  data  to  our  users  is  the  number  of  data  or 
publications downloaded from Eurostat’s website and the number of publications sold during 
2009.  

The figures presented in the table below represent the data accessed by our users available on 
the Eurostat website for Eurostat's publications during the year 2009.  

Table 4. Number of accessed data  
Sold publications (hard copies) 
 - European Business: Facts and figures (Editions from2007 to 2009)6 
Free downloaded publications  
 - European Business: Facts and figures 
Free downloaded datasets  
Annexes I to VII 
- Annual enterprise statistics 
- Annual enterprise statistics by size class 
- Annual regional statistics 
- Preliminary data 
- Other 

64 

14.584 

49.230 
22.814 
8.594 
11.463 
1.744 
4.615 

6 

The production of hard copies was discontinued in 2010. 

EN 

7 

   EN 

 
 
 
 
                                                 
3.3. 

Confidentiality rules and implementation 

The  tables  in  paragraph  3.2  illustrate  the  extent  to  which  confidentiality  has  reduced  data 
availability.  Similar  confidentiality  rules  were  applied  by  all  countries,  mostly  in  order  to 
protect  data  on  one  or  more  enterprises.  Moreover,  in  several  Member  States  this  approach 
was  supplemented  by  a  "dominance  rule"  under  which  data  were  not  disseminated  if  one 
respondent  dominated  the  figures  by  more  than  a  certain  fixed  percentage;  the  percentages 
used vary slightly.  

In addition to the confidentiality of data at country level, data at Community level were also 
suppressed in order to protect confidential national data. The rules for the identification of the 
EU  totals  that  needed  to  be  suppressed  have  been  laid  down  in  a  Confidentiality  Charter 
agreed  with  all  Member  States.  For  2007  data,  as  a  result  of  the  rules  applied,  7  %  of  all 
aggregated EU data for annual enterprise statistics in Annexes I to IV could not be published 
for confidentiality reasons. 

Table  5.  Confidentiality  of  the  main  variables  of  annual  enterprise  statistics  for  which 
EU 2007 aggregates were published; all levels of activity NACE Rev.1.1 

Annex 

Total number of cells 

Number of 
confidential cells 

Number of confidential 
cells in total number (%) 

Annex I 
Annex II  
Annex III  
Annex IV 

Annexes I-IV 

856 
5652 
1252 
324 
8084 

57 
480 
42 
14 
593 

7 
8 
3 
4 
7 

In  order  to  meet  the  users'  needs  for  information,  the  European  Commission  is  currently 
investigating how to make more EU aggregates available. Ways of calculating estimates for 
the  confidential  EU  aggregates  which  would  provide  sufficient  protection  of  the  data  of 
individual  respondents,  while  at  the  same  time  ensuring  a  certain  level  of  accuracy  of  the 
aggregates, have been explored and will be applied from the reference 2008 year onwards.  

For the time being, estimates have been used in order to provide more EU aggregates on the 
basis  of  non-confidential  national  data  in  order  to  fill  the  gaps  for  which  the  actual  values 
could not be disclosed.  

3.4. 

Accuracy 

Under  the  terms  of  Commission  Regulation  (EC)  No  1618/99  of  23  July  1999  (hereinafter 
referred to as "Regulation No 1618/99") concerning the criteria for the evaluation of quality of 
structural business statistics, all Member States shall provide to Eurostat on an annual basis 
information on quality indicators such as the coefficients of variations, the non-response rate 
and two specific reports – one related to the applied methodology and the other related to the 
principal activity.  

On the basis of the information provided by all Member States, Eurostat conducted an annual 
assessment for the 2007 reference year and the main parts have been included in this report.  

EN 

8 

   EN 

 
In  order  to  evaluate  the  quality  of  the  data  provided  at  EU  level,  Eurostat  has  calculated 
aggregated  EU  coefficients  of  variation  for  six  characteristics,  at  group  level  (3  digits)  of 
NACE Rev.1.1, and for all activity sectors.  

The table below shows that, with few exceptions, the aggregated EU coefficients of variation 
for the six compiled characteristics (Number of enterprises, Turnover, Value added, Personnel 
costs, Gross Investments, Number of employees) is below 1.5 %. In general, the coefficients 
of  variation  provided  are  lower  for  industry  and  slightly  higher  for  construction,  trade  and 
services.  

Table 6. Distribution of aggregated EU coefficients of variation (%)  

EU 
coefficients 
of 
variation7 
0.0-0.5 

0.6-1.5 

1.6-2.5 

>2.5 

Number of 
enterprises 

Turnover 

Value 
added 

Personnel 
costs 

Gross 
Investments 

Number of 
employees 

73.5 

26,5 

0 

0 

1.9 

97.2 

0.9 

0 

30.4 

63.7 

5.9 

0 

42.3 

57.1 

0.6 

0 

26.2 

67.8 

4.2 

1.8 

48.5 

48.5 

2.4 

0.6 

Starting  with  the  data  collection  for  the  2008  reference  year,  SBS  data  will  be  evaluated 
annually from the beginning of 2011 on the basis of a new Commission Regulation (EC) No 
275/2010 concerning the implementation of Regulation No 295/2008, as regards the criteria 
for the evaluation of the quality of structural business statistics. The reports will be produced 
in line with the European Statistics Code of Practice.  

3.5. 

Coherence and comparability 

As each Member State is free to choose the way it compiles SBS data, strict compliance with 
the  Commission  Regulations  is  required  in  order  to  ensure  data  comparability  across 
countries. 

As  it  was  mentioned  above,  Member  States  were  asked  to  provide,  for  each  reference  year, 
two  reports  in  which  they  have  the  opportunity  to  provide  Eurostat  and  their  users  with 
information about the applied methodology.  

Coherence  refers  to  the  extent  to  which  statistics  will  allow  the  combined  use  of  data  from 
different  sources,  and  for  this  reason  Eurostat  has  tried  to  identify  which  are  the  common 
features  between  SBS  and  other  business  surveys  and  to  what  extent  they  are  consistent 
(consistency can be considered as a synonym for coherence). Comparability is a special case 
of coherence using data from the same source but for different time periods and/or regions. 

SBS  data  can  be  linked  with  several  other  statistical  domains  such  as:  National  accounts, 
Labour  cost  survey,  Labour  force  and  Short  term  statistics.  However,  in  order  to  make 
combined use of these statistics, their coherence must be ensured.  

7 

The coefficients of variation were calculated for final 2007 data for Series 1A, 2A, 3B and 4A (Annexes 
I-IV), on NACE Rev.1.1, at 3-digit level (groups) or regroupings as mentioned in section 9 of Annex 1 
to the SBS Regulation.  

EN 

9 

   EN 

 
                                                 
The coherence between Structural business statistics and the domains mentioned above were 
analysed in the past, and a number of differences in both the data and the methodology were 
discovered. This is not unexpected, as each domain has defined the methodology in the way 
which best suits the particular analysis. 

Business  and  Trade  statistics  are  confronted  by  major  challenges  in  a  globalised  world.  A 
strong  movement  towards  integration  of  world  markets  is  changing  the  structure  of  the 
economy and the way businesses operate. Eurostat has therefore developed a programme for 
the  modernisation  and  better  integration  of  enterprises  and  trade  statistics  (MEETS)8.  The 
programme will run for a period of six years from 2008 to 2013.  

One  important  project  under  the  MEETS  programme  is  on  “Consistency  of  concepts  and 
methods of business-related statistics” which has started in the third quarter of 2010 and will 
run for a period of 48 months. This project will help improve the consistency of concepts and 
facilitate  the  production  of  integrated  legislation  governing  enterprise  and  trade  statistics  in 
the future.  

4. 

COMPLIANCE  WITH  THE  STRUCTURAL  BUSINESS  STATISTICS  (SBS) 
REGULATION 

Compliance  with  the  SBS  Regulation  is  evaluated  on  the  basis  of  the  punctuality  of  data 
transmitted by the Member States, and also on the completeness of the data and the number of 
versions needed before the final release. 

Overall,  the  compliance  level  for  2007  data  has  been  increased  relative  to  the  compliance 
level  recorded  in  the  previous  report.  A  full  analysis  of  all  compliance  issues,  in  particular 
those  related  to  comparability,  will  not  be  possible  until  the  renewed  quality  reports  are 
available in May 2011. 

Punctuality has improved generally over the years. However, some countries continue to send 
their data with some delay, which has influenced the punctuality of the dissemination of EU 
aggregates.  

Compared with the previous report, the most notable improvements from the punctuality point 
of view were made by Belgium, Ireland, Greece and Slovenia.  

However,  Belgium  and  Greece  sent  their  data  with  some  delay.  First  data  for  2007  were 
provided by Malta with a major delay.  

As far as the completeness of the datasets transmitted by the countries is concerned, when all 
datasets for the definitive series of Annexes I to IV provided by the EU-27 and Norway are 
taken  together,  they  make  up  90%  of  the  required  data.  This  represents  a  significant 
improvement in comparison with the situation described in the previous report provided to the 
European Parliament and to the Council in 2007, but it is still insufficient. Several countries 
are taking action to improve data availability. 

8 

OJ L 340, 19.12.2008 - (Decision No 1297/2008/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 
16 December 2008 on a Programme for the Modernisation of European Enterprise and Trade Statistics 
(MEETS)).  

EN 

10 

   EN 

                                                 
Preliminary 2008 data were provided by most of the countries before the deadline set in the 
Regulation. A few countries sent their data with some delay, for instance around 20 days after 
the deadline in the case of Belgium and Italy, and with a delay of more than one month for 
Greece and Poland. In general, punctuality has not improved for these data sets compared to 
last year, but this situation was due to the fact that the 2008 reference year was affected by the 
implementation of NACE Rev.2. Overall, 94% of the required data is available. 

Data for Annexes V to VII were still missing for some series. Overall, 73 % of the required 
data for financial annexes is available. 

The  assessment  presented  in  table  7  shows  an  overall  evaluation  of  compliance  for  all 
Member States that were subject to the SBS Regulation for reference year 2007 (EU-27 and 
Norway).  

The  evaluation  was  based  on  the  punctuality,  completeness  of  the  data  and  the  number  of 
versions  provided  for  final  2007  data  in  respect  of  Annexes  I  to  VII  and  also  in  respect  of 
preliminary 2008 data for Annexes I to IV. 

The countries have been divided into four categories of compliance: 

Very good compliance, all required data (with minor exceptions) were delivered 

Good compliance, a few elements missing or minor delays in data delivery.  
Data were partially available but major elements of compliance were missing or 

VG  = 
on time.  
G 
P 
deadlines were not met. 

= 
= 

N 

= 

A large part of the data was missing or there were major delays in data delivery. 

Table 7. Overall assessment of compliance 

Countries 

Overall score 

EE, ES, FR, LV, LT, HU, AT, PT, RO, SK, FI, SE, NO 

BE, BG, CZ, DK ,DE, IE, IT, CY, LU, NL, PL, UK, SI 

GR 

MT 

VG 

G 

P 

N 

From the table above it can be noted that the compliance level was "very good" or "good" for 
most of the Member States. Moreover, Malta has made considerable efforts to solve the non-
compliance issues and has begun transmitting data for previous reference years. All countries 
intend to increase the level of compliance from reference year 2008 onwards. 

Eurostat has carried out actions in order to increase the level of compliance in two areas. First, 
a  compliance  report  has  been  submitted  to  the  SBS  Steering  Group  twice  yearly  and  to  the 
Business Statistics Directors once a year. Letters from the Director-General of Eurostat to the 
Heads of National Statistical Institutes have also been used to address cases of serious non-
compliance.  In  addition  to  monitoring  and  reporting,  bilateral  contacts  have  been  made  in 
order to investigate and resolve shortcomings in compliance. 

EN 

11 

   EN 

 
Secondly,  Eurostat  has  tried  to  find  ways  to  facilitate  data  transmission,  e.g.  by  simplifying 
the data transmission formats and by streamlining the data requirements, especially with the 
new SBS Recast Regulation.  

5. 

THE BURDEN ON BUSINESSES AND ACTION TO REDUCE IT 

5.1. 

Introduction 

The Commission Communication of March 2005 on "Better Regulation for Growth and Jobs" 
identified simplification as a priority action for the EU. In the Commission Communication 
on  the  reduction  of  the  response  burden,  efforts  to  simplify  and  set  priorities  in  the  field  of 
Community Statistics ((COM (2006) 693 final) were directed more specifically at statistics.  

As mentioned before, in order to reduce the burden on data providers and also on businesses, 
the "recast" SBS regulation aims to keep the burden on enterprises as light as possible and, for 
this reason, a number of mandatory or optional variables were deleted or had their frequency 
changed from annual to multi-annual.  

5.2. 

Actions taken to reduce the burden 

This section summarises the actions taken by Eurostat and the Member States in recent years 
in order to reduce the costs and the burden on business.  

Eurostat has worked together with the National Statistical Institutes to find ways of reducing 
the burden on businesses. The recast of the SBS Regulation reduced the number of mandatory 
variables,  by  moving  some  variables  from  annual  to  multi-annual  frequency  and  also  by 
deleting optional variables.  

Additionally, the SBS recast introduces the possibility for countries simply to contribute to 
the European totals (CETO flags) without being obliged to provide detailed data when the 
figures are not sufficiently reliable to be published at national level.  

Some of the actions taken by Member States were related to their way of organising the SBS 
data collection. Sample surveys were frequently used by the majority of the Member States. 
All but one of the 27 Member States have used a sample survey or a combination of sample 
survey  and  data  collected  from  other  sources,  instead  of  censuses.  Member  States  have 
focused on applying new sampling strategies in order to reduce both the burden on business 
and the costs of National Statistical Institutes. 

Additionally,  a  number  of  countries  have  excluded  small  businesses  from  their  surveys  and 
used administrative data sources combined with estimates instead. 

In many Member States there is a strong and growing preference for using administrative data 
sources  instead  of  carrying  out  surveys.  However,  there  are  several  obstacles  to  using 
administrative data sources alone, due to the fact that administrative data normally differ from 
statistical  data  in  terms  of  definitions,  formats,  codes,  transmission  protocols,  etc.  For  this 
reason,  political  support  is  needed  to  establish  agreements  between  the  National  Statistical 
Institutes and the relevant governmental organisations on producing administrative data which 
would serve the relevant purposes.  

Moving from surveys to the use of administrative data sources requires an initial investment 
in the form of additional internal resources and new adjusted working methods at the level of 
the National Statistical Institutes before efficiency gains can be materialised.  

EN 

12 

   EN 

Some  countries  have  also  started  to  explore  more  direct  ways  of  collecting  data,  including 
direct  collection  from  company  accounts.  Ideally,  statistics  would  be  generated  as  a  by-
product  of  the  regular  accounting  by  enterprises,  data  would  be  processed  automatically, 
common  identifiers  would  enable  the  collected  information  to  be  used  in  the  most  efficient 
way and the information would automatically be forwarded, for example to Eurostat, as soon 
as it is processed. 

To conclude, the burden on businesses is an issue which is taken into consideration whenever 
changes  are  made  to  data  requirements  or  data  production  processes.  However,  producing 
high quality SBS data, which correspond to users' needs in a cost effective way, is the main 
objective.  

6. 

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT  

The European  Statistical  System is constantly looking to identify ways of dealing with new 
and emerging needs for statistics, whilst at the same time making great efforts to reduce both 
the burden on respondents and the costs of producing statistics. 

Moreover,  given  the  increasing  importance  of  European  statistics  -  at  EU  level  -  for  the 
development,  implementation,  monitoring  and  evaluation  of  EU  policies,  the  Commission 
(Eurostat) has issued a Communication on the production method for EU statistics - a vision 
for  the  next  decade9.  This  Communication  offers  a  vision  for  reforming  the  way  in  which 
European statistics are produced. 

The MEETS programme for the modernisation and better integration of enterprise and trade 
statistics,  which  has  already  been  mentioned,  is  taking  practical  steps  to  implement  this 
vision.  The  aims  of  the  programme  are  to  develop  target  sets  of  indicators  and  conduct  a 
review  of  priorities;  devise  a  streamlined  framework  of  business-related  statistics;  and 
implement a smarter way of collecting data and of modernising and simplifying Intrastat. 

9 

COM  (2009)  404  final:  Communication  from  the  Commission  to  the  European  parliament  and  the 
Council on the production method of EU statistics: a vision for the next decade. 

EN 

13 

   EN