REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL on the application of Regulation (EU) No 549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 May 2013 on the European system of national and regional accounts in the European Union
Date: 2023-06-13
Institutions: European Commission, Eurostat
Subjects: EU statistics, Economic and Monetary Union, European accounting system, application of EU law, data collection, data transmission, economic analysis, economic statistics, financial statistics, national accounts

EN 

  EN 

   EUROPEAN COMMISSION  Brussels, 13.6.2023  COM(2023) 308 final  REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL on the application of Regulation (EU) No 549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 May 2013 on the European system of national and regional accounts in the European Union  
 
 
1. 

Introduction 

Regulation (EU) No 549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 May 2013 
on the European system of national and regional accounts in the European Union (the referred 
to  as  ‘ESA  2010  Regulation’1  or  ‘the  Regulation’)  in  Article  12  requires  that  a  report  be 
provided every 5 years to the European Parliament and the Council on the application of this 
Regulation. 

The  European  system  of  national  and  regional  accounts  (ESA  2010)  is  the  internationally 
compatible EU accounting framework for a systematic and detailed description of an economy. 
It is the source for a multitude of key economic indicators for policy making and economic 
analysis  by  governments,  international  institutions  and  academia,  including  gross  domestic 
product (GDP). 

This report intends to satisfy the requirement to report in 2023 on the application of the ESA 
2010 Regulation.  

2. 

a) 

Implementation of the Regulation 

Quality of ESA 2010 data on national and regional accounts  

The  Commission  (Eurostat)  regularly  assesses  whether  Member  States’  data  quality  is  in 
accordance with ESA 2010 requirements.  

This section presents Eurostat’s assessment of the quality of national and regional accounts 
sent by the EU Member States, Iceland, Norway and Switzerland in 20212. 

The  quality  assessment  was  carried  out  in  accordance  with  Article 4  of  the  ESA  2010 
Regulation, which requires the quality of national and regional accounts data sent to Eurostat 
to be assessed according to the quality criteria of the European Statistical System established 
by  Regulation  (EC)  No  223/2009  on  European  statistics3.  Commission  Implementing 
Regulation No 2016/23044 sets out the modalities, structure, periodicity and indicators of the 
assessment process. 

The data sent in 2021 were broadly in line with the quality standards of the European Statistical 
System and the ESA 2010 Regulation. In general, Member States have been able to comply 

1 OJ L 174, 26.6.2013, p. 1. 
2 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/esa-2010/esa-2010-implementation-and-data-quality  
3 Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2009 on European 
statistics and repealing Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1101/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council 
on  the  transmission  of  data  subject  to  statistical  confidentiality  to  the  Statistical  Office  of  the  European 
Communities, Council Regulation (EC) No 322/97 on Community Statistics, and Council Decision 89/382/EEC, 
Euratom  establishing  a  Committee  on  the  Statistical  Programmes  of  the  European  Communities  (OJ  L  87, 
31.3.2009, p. 164). 
4  Commission  Implementing  Regulation  (EU)  2016/2304  of  19  December  2016  on  the  modalities,  structure, 
periodicity and assessment indicators of the quality reports on data transmitted pursuant to Regulation (EU) No 
549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council (OJ L 345, 20.12.2016, p. 27). 

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with  the  data  requirements  and  methodology.  The  overall  results  for  the  different  quality 
criteria are provided below. 

Relevance and availability of ESA 2010 data 

In 2021, both quarterly and annual national accounts mandatory data were reported with high 
completeness.  The  EU  average  completeness  rates  for  each  national  accounts  domain  were 
between 96% and 100%.  

The percentage of complete tables increased from 86% in 2018 to 92% in 2021. The expiration 
of  outstanding  derogation  and  the  completion  of  the  2019  round  of  benchmark  revisions 
generally  improved  overall  data  availability.  There  were  also  fewer  tables  delivered  with 
shortcomings5. 

In the continuous effort to meet changing user needs, Eurostat began the mid-term review of 
the ESA 2010 Regulation6 in 2018. A major focus of the project was to improve the ‘cross-
domain consistency’ of national accounts data (based on work in a dedicated task force), to 
minimise the inconsistencies in different parts of the accounts or derived administrative data. 
New policy-related demands, mainly related to (government) interactions with the institutions 
and  bodies  of  the  EU  were  also  taken  into  consideration,  ensuring  a  solid  legal  basis  on 
quarterly  government  revenue,  expenditure  and  the  deficit,  an  improved  timeliness  of  the 
Classification  of  the  functions  of  government  (COFOG)  data  and  annual  financial  sector 
accounts  and  the  revision  of  the  Classification  of  individual  consumption  by  purpose 
(COICOP). 

Accuracy 

The accuracy of ESA 2010 data is ensured during regular data validation by (a) analysis of 
outliers, (b) analysis of revisions and (c) verification of adherence to the methodology.  The 
analysis of revision rates of key European aggregates showed that Member States provide data 
of good quality, enabling Eurostat to publish early and reliable GDP and employment estimates 
for  both  EU  and  euro-area  aggregates.  Most  EU  Member  States,  Iceland,  Norway  and 
Switzerland publish online information on their national revision policies. The coverage of the 
information on revisions is continuously improving over the years also for financial accounts, 
regional accounts and supply use input-output tables. 

Timeliness and punctuality 

In  2021,  the  punctuality  of  transmissions  was  high,  with  most  countries  sending  their 
mandatory quarterly accounts at or shortly before the official transmission deadline. For the 

5 Details of the analysis can be found in chapter 4 of Eurostat assessment of the quality of national and regional 
accounts’ data, 2022 edition. 
6 See Regulation (EU) No 2023/734 of the European Parliament and the Council of 15 March 2023 amending 
Regulation (EU) No 549/2013 on the European system of national and regional accounts in the European Union 
and repealing 11 legal acts in the field of national accounts, OJ L 97, 5.4.2023, p. 1–114. 

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ESA 2010 tables transmitted annually, 11 Member States sent all required annual national and 
regional accounts tables on time. 

Accessibility and clarity 

All EU Member States and EFTA countries publish online documentation on national accounts 
methodology and compilation methods. A comprehensive set of documentation is accessible 
online  for  most  EU  Member  States.  The  content  of  the  available  information  varies  across 
countries and for some domains it can be further developed and enriched with relevant details. 

Coherence 

In 2021, overall internal coherence within and between tables was very high for all countries. 
As  regards  cross-domain  coherence,  most  countries  succeeded  in  keeping  cross-domain 
differences below 0.3% of GDP. Absolute vertical discrepancies between annual financial and 
non-financial sector accounts for the non-financial corporation and household sectors were 1.5 
and 2% of GDP respectively, and below 0.1% of GDP for the general government sector.  

Actions undertaken to improve data quality 

Member States have made significant efforts to improve data quality in accordance with ESA 
2010  requirements.  The  Commission  (Eurostat)  supports  these  efforts  through  meetings, 
workshops,  courses,  guidance  manuals  and  documents.  Technical  cooperation  is  conducted 
through the Working Groups on National Accounts and Excessive Deficit Procedure Statistics 
under  the  guidance  of  the  Directors  of  Macroeconomic  Statistics  of  the  National  Statistical 
Institutes. 

Financial  support  from  the  Commission  to  Member  States  is  an  important  tool  to  further 
improve the completeness, comparability and consistency of ESA 2010 data. Between 2018 
and 2022, Member States were benefiting from grants to improve ESA 2010 data in specific 
areas,  including  the  development  of  voluntary  data  such  as  flash  estimates  and  of  data  still 
covered by derogations (until 2020). 

Conclusion 

Data  quality  improved  significantly  between  January  2019  and  February  2022.  This  is 
attributed to: (a) the expiration of all temporary derogations on 1 January 20207; and (b) the 
benchmark  revision  that  was  coordinated  for  many  countries  in  2019  with  a  few  others 
following in 2020 and 2021.  

The  COVID-19  crisis  gave  rise  to  new  challenges  for  the  national  accounts  compilation8. 
Eurostat  supported  national  statistical  institutes  (NSIs)  in  addressing  these  challenges  by 

7 With the exception of Switzerland that has derogations valid until 2024. 
8 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/737960/9861115/COVID19_national_accounts_QandA.pdf and 
https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/government-finance-statistics/methodology/guidance-on-accounting-rules  

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providing guidance notes in many areas9 and encouraging the regular exchange of experiences 
between Member States in various fora.  

b) 

Effectiveness of the Regulation and of the monitoring process 

Effectiveness of the Regulation 

Several  initiatives  on  the  compilation  of  national  accounts  have  been  launched,  progressed 
or/and  were  completed  since  the  2018  publication  of  the  first  quality  report10  and  its  two 
accompanying Commission staff working documents11. 

On globalisation, the most relevant initiatives include the launch of the early warning system 
(EWS), the development of integrated global accounts (IGA), the consolidation of the Euro-
groups  register  (EGR),  the  GNI  MNE  (gross  national  income  generated  by  multinational 
enterprises) pilot  exercise, the European Profiling of large MultiNational  Enterprise (MNE) 
groups, the creation of Large cases units in most EU Member States, and the creation of an 
MNE network that now also encompasses the EWS. Following up on the Conference of the 
Directors Generals of the National Statistical Institutes (DGINS conference) of 2019 and the 
‘Bratislava  memorandum’,  its  outcome  document,  all  European  Statistical  System  (ESS) 
initiatives  on  globalisation  have  been integrated  into  a  systematic  approach  to  address  the 
statistical challenges related to globalisation.  

Moreover, Eurostat has launched into regular production a new set of EU inter-country supply, 
use and input-output tables (FIGARO tables) in 202112. The key objective of FIGARO tables 
is to make it possible to link EU economies with each other as well as with non-EU partners 
and  to  provide  national  and  international  organisations  a  reference  point  to  analyse  trade, 
globalisation, socio-economic, macroeconomic and environmental policies for EU countries.  

In  the  same  period,  Eurostat  has  also  substantially  contributed  to  the  development  of  an 
internationally agreed framework, in the form of digital supply and use tables, to measure and 
analyse the digital economy, and is currently promoting its implementation with the ESS NSIs. 
In  addition,  work  is  ongoing  to  enhance  data  sources  on  the  production  and  use  of  digital 
services, including e-trade, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence.  

Regarding Eurostat’s growth and productivity  accounts (GPA) project, Eurostat published a 
set of additional productivity indicators on 15 December 202113. The specific objectives were 

9 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/data/metadata/covid-19-support-for-statisticians 
10 Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council on the application of Regulation 
(EU) No 549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 May 2013 on the European system of 
national and regional accounts in the European Union and on the application of the granted derogations, COM 
(2018) 506 final report 
11 Commission Staff working document, ESA 2010 data availability and application of granted derogations, 
SWD/2018/354 final, and Commission Staff working document, Quality Report on National and Regional 
Accounts. 2016 data, SWD/2018/355 final. 
12 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/esa-supply-use-input-tables/figaro  
13 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/national-accounts/methodology/european-accounts/productivity-indicators  

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to  extend  Eurostat's  publication  of  labour  productivity  indicators  (LPI)  and  to  prepare  and 
publish capital productivity indicators (CAPI) to better meet the policy needs of the European 
Semester and the EU Digital Agenda. The multifactor productivity indicator (MFP), based on 
hours  worked  and  capital  stocks  data  in  national  accounts,  was  also  published.  A  quality 
adjusted labour index (QALI) has been published since 2018. This measures labour input to 
economic  production,  taking  into  account  both  the  composition  of  the  workforce  and  the 
number  of  hours  worked.  Moreover,  the  Task  force  on  fixed  assets  and  estimation  of 
consumption  of  fixed  capital  under  ESA  2010  (TF  FIXCAP)  has  developed  a  set  of 
recommendations with the aim to increase harmonisation in the compilation of stocks of fixed 
assets and consumption of fixed capital across countries.  

Eurostat also made progress on developing household distributional accounts (HDA) estimates 
by  breaking  down  national  accounts  variables  with  indicators  derived  from  microdata.  In 
December 2020, Eurostat14 and the OECD15 published for the first time experimental results of 
the distribution of households income and consumption aligned with the macroeconomic totals. 
In 2022, Eurostat initiated a new Task force on Household distributional accounts (TF HDA) 
which provides a forum to share experience and knowledge that helps countries to estimate 
their own distributional accounts or improve the quality of results achieved so far. 

Effectiveness of the monitoring process applied to the ESA 2010 

The implementation of the ESA 2010 in the Member States is monitored in different ways.  

Eurostat,  in  cooperation  with  the  national  data  compilers,  is  continuously  working  on 
improving data availability for its users. Data availability is monitored regularly during periods 
of data production. There is a limited number of cases where countries’ failure to provide data 
in accordance with the ESA 2010 obligations harms data availability. In these cases Eurostat 
reminds  the  Member  States  concerned  of  the  transmission  requirements  by  periodically 
monitoring their compliance with the ESA 2010 Regulation. 

The quality of ESA 2010 data submitted by the Member States is systematically monitored at 
each step of the validation procedure for each national accounts domain, as well as during the 
annual quality reporting exercise. In the latter, Eurostat prefills the country quality reports with 
the quantitative indicators for each quality criterion set out in Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 
on  European  statistics.  The  countries  then  check  the  correctness  of  the  indicators  and 
complement and comment on their country report. Eurostat drafts an overall assessment and 
individual  recommendations  for  the  country  reports,  which  are  eventually  agreed  with  the 
countries and validated by Eurostat. The results of the national quality reporting exercise are 
summarised in  the quality  report on  national  and  regional  accounts that is  published on the 
Eurostat website in December every year.  

14 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/experimental-statistics/ic-social-surveys-and-national-accounts  
15 http://www.oecd.org/sdd/na/household-distributional-results-in-line-with-national-accounts-experimental-

statistics.htm; https://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=EGDNA_PUBLIC   

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The data reported for gross national income (GNI) are monitored in a dedicated process in the 
context of own resources, governed by Regulation (EU) 2019/516 16 (the ‘GNI Regulation’). 
A transition mechanism is in place under which ESA 2010-based estimates of GNI for the years 
2010 to 2013 are converted into ESA 95 figures using an agreed method. From the reporting 
year 2014 onwards, the GNI own resource is based on ESA 2010 data. 

Under the GNI Regulation, the Commission (Eurostat) verifies the sources and methods used 
by  Member  States  to  calculate  GNI.  It  does  this  using  annual  and  multiannual  verification 
mechanisms. 

The annual verification process is based on the data sent through the GNI questionnaires and 
accompanying reports on the quality of GNI data sent out before 1 October each year.  

The multiannual verification focuses mainly on the inventory of the sources and methods used 
to produce GNI aggregates and their components (GNI inventory), submitted by each Member 
State and discussed in Eurostat visits to the countries. Where the Commission considers that 
changes should be made to the methodology underlying the GNI figures, it can place  action 
points and reservations, resulting in improved figures where needed. The Commission Report 
on the application of the GNI Regulation from 202217 summarises the progress made by the 
Commission and the Gross National Income Expert Group on the harmonisation of GNI . 

Government deficit and debt data are monitored and verified in the context of the excessive 
deficit  procedure  (EDP).  This  also  involves  validating  the  underlying  government  finance 
statistics (GFS) data in relation to  the EDP. The legal basis for monitoring the  EDP data is 
Council  Regulation  (EC)  No  479/200918.  Commission  Regulation  (EU)  No  220/201419 
stipulates that ESA 2010 must be used for EDP and GFS purposes as of 1 September 2014. 

Eurostat’s  assessment  concentrates  on  the  factors  that  explain  the  general  government  net 
lending/net borrowing and gross debt (as a percentage of GDP) and the changes in the ratio of 
general government debt to GDP. Member States send this information to Eurostat twice a year 
in the EDP notification tables, the Questionnaire relating to the EDP notification tables, other 
related questionnaires and via bilateral clarifications. 

16 Regulation (EU) 2019/516 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 March 2019 on the 
harmonisation of gross national income at market prices and repealing Council Directive 89/130/EEC, Euratom 
and Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1287/2003 (GNI Regulation), OJ L 91, 29.3.2019, p. 19. 
17 Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council on the application of Regulation 
(EU) 2019/516 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 March 2019 on the harmonisation of gross 
national income at market prices and repealing Council Directive 89/130/EEC, Euratom and Council Regulation 
(EC, Euratom) No 1287/2003 (GNI Regulation), COM/2022/733 final. 
18 Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2009 of 25 May 2009 on the  application of the  Protocol on the  excessive 
deficit procedure annexed to the Treaty establishing the European Community (OJ L 145, 10.6.2009, p. 1).  
19 Commission Regulation (EU) No 220/2014 of 7 March 2014 amending Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2009 
as regards references to the European system of national and regional accounts in the European Union (OJ L 69, 
8.3.2014, p. 101).  

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The legal basis of  the  EDP  provides for regular  in-depth  reporting to  the Council20 and the 
European  Parliament,  including  on  GFS  aspects.  Eurostat  also  regularly  reports  on  the 
consistency of the underlying GFS data with the EDP as well as on comparability, accuracy, 
availability/timeliness  and  dissemination  aspects  (as  well  as  a  range  of  additional  quality 
indicators). 

Detailed sources and methods used to compile the general government accounts are published 
in the EDP inventories21.  

A  continuing  effort  to  ensure  the  comparability  and  harmonisation  with  ESA  2010  rules  is 
reflected in the publication of updated versions of the Manual on Government Deficit22 and 
Debt  in  2019  and  2022,  which  serve,  among  other  objectives,  to  facilitate  the  harmonised 
benchmark revisions.  

Overall, the quality of the reporting of fiscal data continued to improve. In general, Member 
States provided higher quality data, more complete information in EDP notification tables, and 
other relevant statistical information. 

Macroeconomic  imbalances  procedure  (MIP)  indicators  are  calculated  on  the  basis  of 
underlying  statistics  produced  by  national  statistical  institutes  and  central  banks,  stemming 
from different domains including national accounts and balance of payments. Eurostat actively 
monitors the quality of those underlying statistics and in particular the consistency between 
balance of payments and national accounts statistics, with a focus on non-financial accounts. 
For the monitoring of financial accounts and balance of payments, Eurostat cooperates with 
the European Central Bank. 

The  MIP  indicators  stemming  from  national  accounts  have  met  the  relevant  coverage  and 
timeliness requirements since the beginning of the MIP exercise. The quality is continuously 
monitored. 

The  introduction  of  ESA  2010  ensured  the  consistency  of  GDP  compilation  with  the 
international  standards for national  accounts. This  contributes to  a better comparability, not 
only across EU Member States, but also across the world.  

A common harmonised European revision policy (HERP) for national accounts and balance of 
payments  statistics  covering  benchmark  and  routine  revisions  has  been  developed  and  its 
voluntary implementation by the Member States has progressed. The policy aims to improve 
adherence to the twofold principle of alignment at national level between statistical domains 
and  coordinated  alignment  at  EU  level  across  Member  States.  Eurostat  is  monitoring  the 
adherence  to  HERP  of  EU  Member  States  and  EFTA  countries.  In  2019,  the  handbook  on 

20 The Economic and Financial Committee.  
21 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/government-finance-statistics/excessive-deficit-procedure/edp-inventories  
22 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/government-finance-statistics/methodology/manuals  

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Practical guidelines for revising ESA 2010 data23 was published. This provides good practices 
for routine and benchmark revisions as well as for non-scheduled revisions.  

The handbook on Consistency of ESA 2010 based national accounts24, published in 2020, aims 
to  support  compilers’  efforts  to  improve  the  consistency  of  national  accounts.  It  contains 
definitions, explanations, recommendations and examples of good practice under the ESA 2010 
Regulation that aim to ensure that the output of national accounts compilation is numerically 
consistent. 

Taking the above into account, the Commission considers that the ESA 2010 Regulation, in 
combination with various monitoring activities based on other legal frameworks (as described 
above) is effective in ensuring the provision of high-quality and comparable, up-to-date and 
reliable data by the Member States for EU policy and other purposes.  

c) 

Progress on contingent liabilities data 

Data on contingent liabilities are collected by Eurostat in the context of Council Directive 
2011/85/EU25. Article 14(3) of that Directive sets out new statistical requirements for the 
Member States.  

The ESA 2010 Regulation acknowledges this (in Recitals 19, 20 and 22) and requires the 
Commission  to  report  to  Parliament  and  the  Council  on  the  availability  of  the  related 
information at specified intervals (see Articles 11 and 12). Therefore, in February 2019, the 
Commission  published the second ‘Report on implicit  liabilities with  potential impact  on 
public budgets’26. 

The data collected by Eurostat in the context of the above Directive are the main source of 
information on government contingent liabilities in Member States27. The templates for the 
data  collection  and  the  implementation  guidance  were  provided  in  Eurostat’s  Decision 
of 22 July 2013 on government deficit and debt - supplement on contingent liabilities and 
potential obligations to the EDP related questionnaire28. 

This Decision specifies that Eurostat collects and publishes selected indicators related to the 
liabilities:  government  guarantees,  off-balance  public-private 
following  contingent 

23 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3859598/9530664/KS-GQ-18-012-EN-N.pdf/19dc3542-aa34-4b6b-
a981-8a4f244074e8  
24 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-manuals-and-guidelines/-/ks-gq-20-004 
25 Council Directive 2011/85/EU of 8 November 2011 on requirements for budgetary frameworks of the 
Member States (OJ L 306, 23.11.2011, p. 41) 
26 Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council on implicit liabilities with potential 
impact on public budgets, COM/2019/81 final.  
27 Other Eurostat data collections also exist (i.e. the Supplementary table for financial crisis, the EDP related 
questionnaire, etc.). These provide limited and/or confidential information on particular types of contingent 
liabilities.  
28 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/1015035/2041337/ESTAT-decision-Suppl-on-conting-liab-EDP-
Q.pdf/0b35165a-ee53-470a-a15a-7beaa98aac8b 

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partnerships (PPPs), liabilities of government-controlled entities classified outside general 
government (public corporations) and non-performing loans (government assets29). 

The Member States published data at national level and provided them to Eurostat for the 
first time by end-December 2014. Since then, an annual data collection has been taking place, 
followed by the Eurostat publication by end-January (T+13 months) of each year. Eurostat 
publishes  the  figures  in  millions  of  national  currency  and  as  percentages  of  GDP  in  its 
the  related  metadata  and  country-specific  footnotes.  An 
database, 
accompanying  News  item  release30,  as  well  as  a  statistics-explained  article31  are  also 
published32. 

together  with 

The Member States continued to make progress on the completeness (in terms of including 
all liabilities) and the coverage of the data (in terms  of covering all of general government). 
All Member States provided the requested data and a number of Member States reviewed 
and revised their figures to better align with the agreed guidelines. 

The  completeness  and  the  coverage  of  data  vary  by  indicator  and  by  Member  State.  In 
Eurostat’s data collection, complete and good coverage data are available for most Member 
States for all indicators. However, for some Member States data are not yet fully exhaustive, 
in  particular  for  local  government.  Some  further  improvements  are  needed  on  data  about 
non-performing  loans.  For  several  Member  States,  progress  is  still  needed  on  the  timely 
availability of data on liabilities of government controlled entities classified outside general 
government. 

4. 

Conclusions  

This  report  analyses  the  quality  of  ESA  2010  data,  the  effectiveness  of  the  ESA  2010 
Regulation  and  monitoring  processes  as  well  as  the  progress  on  contingent  liabilities,  as 
required by Article 12 of the Regulation. 

ESA 2010 was first implemented in the Member States in September 2014. Implementation 
has continued since then, e.g. by resolving derogations granted to individual Member States. 
Since its introduction, the completeness of data has significantly improved. Data availability 
of contingent liabilities, partially supplied under separate legislation has also improved. 

The GNI verification process has resulted in improvements  to the reliability, comparability, 
and exhaustiveness of the GNI data as Member States have implemented a number of revisions 
to address the identified action points and GNI reservations. 

29 The Member States should publish the same indicators at national level and also the data on the participation 
of government in the capital of corporations. 
30 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/government-finance-statistics/publications  
31 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Contingent_liabilities_and_non-
performing_loans_-_statistics 
32 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/government-finance-statistics/contingent-liabilities 

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Following the first benchmark revisions to ESA 2010 data introduced by most countries in or 
around  2019,  the  next  coordinated  benchmark  revision  of  national  accounts  and  balance  of 
payments is agreed for 2024. Since 2014, during benchmark revisions and other major ad-hoc 
revisions, Member States have improved data sources and harmonised methods. Eurostat has 
taken steps to prepare for and communicate effectively on the 2024 benchmark revision. To 
this  end,  good  practices  in  line  with  the  harmonised  European  revision  policy  (HERP)  and 
agreed official communication are emphasised. 

The  midterm  review  of  the  ESA  2010  transmission  programme  began  in  2018.  The 
Commission’s  proposal  for  amending  Regulation  (EU)  No  549/2013  was  discussed  by  the 
Council and the European Parliament during 2022. The interinstitutional negotiations between 
the  three  institutions  took  place  in  October  2022.  Following  adoption  by  the  European 
Parliament on 2 February 2023, the agreed Regulation was published in the Official Journal on 
15 March 2023 and it will apply to data transmissions starting from September 2024. 

The  Commission  considers  that  the  ESA  2010  Regulation,  in  combination  with  various 
monitoring activities based on other legal frameworks, is effective in ensuring the provision of 
high-quality and comparable, up-to-date and reliable data by the Member States for EU policy 
and other purposes. 

10