Council Directive 72/211/EEC of 30 May 1972 concerning coordinated statistics on the business cycle in industry and small craft industries

COUNCIL DIRECTIVE of 30 May 1972 concerning coordinated statistics on the business cycle in industry and small craft industries (72/211/EEC)
THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES
,
Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community, and in particular Article 213 thereof;
Having regard to the draft submitted by the Commission;
Whereas the Commission, in order to carry out the tasks entrusted to it under the Treaty, must have at its disposal coherent statistics, comparable as between States, on the economic situation of industry and small craft industries in Member States;
Whereas, as regards statistics for the study of business-cycle and economic developments, the Council, in its Recommendation of 28 July 1966 to the Member States on certain provisions to be adopted for improving business-cycle statistics, pointed out that there were significant gaps in those statistics and stressed the need for improvement ; whereas the Conjunctural Policy Committee, in its Opinion of 22 July 1969 on the implementation of that Recommendation, noted that some of the suggestions made in the Recommendation had indeed been put into effect, but that - particularly as regards industry - certain data essential to analysis and to the formulation of conjunctural policy were still not available in most Member States ; whereas the Committee therefore pointed to certain statistical data on industry referred to in the Council Recommendation which should first be obtained so as to provide a basis for monthly business-cycle statistics, and thus, at least partially, fill the existing gaps;
Whereas valid comparisons cannot be drawn from statistics unless these are based on coordinated definitions and methods;
Whereas the increasing international interpenetration and interdependence not only of industrial and small craft undertakings and of competing markets but also of business conditions and economic policies now require that statistics on industry and small craft industries be compiled for the purpose of examining business-cycle and economic developments in the Communities ; whereas these statistics also provide invaluable information for coordinating short-term economic policy with medium-term economic objectives;
Whereas it is hoped that short-term statistics on industry and small craft industries will provide extensive information for the overall study of general economic trends and relations and also reveal the business-cycle trends in the various branches of industry ; whereas they ought, therefore, to help in making possible the analysis of disturbances and discrepancies in certain markets of the Communities ; and of their rate of growth or regression, and this requires a breakdown of statistics by branch of industry;