tasks that all firms conduct regardless of the sector where they operate; and sector specific business functions (module C) which are relevant only for firms in a given sector. All firms in our sample respond to module B, but only those firms belonging to the sectors for which we have developed a sector specific module respond to C. To attain a wide coverage that allows a meaningful study of sector-specific technologies, we develop sector-specific modules for ten significant sectors in the economy.<sup>8</sup> These sectors have been selected to represent of all three primary sectors (agriculture, manufacturing, and services) and based on their size in the economies where we have administered the FAT survey, in terms of value-added, employment, and number of establishments.

A key aspect of the design of modules B and C is to determine the business functions and technologies covered in the survey. To this end, we proceeded in three steps. First, we conducted desk research revising the specialized literature. Second, we held meetings with experts across the World Bank Group in each of the sectors covered. Third, we reached out to external consultants with significant experience in the field (at least 15 years).<sup>9</sup> This process helped us identify the main functions, both general and sector-specific, conducted in companies and the technologies that can be used to perform the key tasks in each of the identified functions. Figure 1 presents the general business functions considered in the survey and the possible technologies that can be used to conduct each of them. In total, we consider 7 general business functions and 36 technologies. Similarly, Figure 2 exemplifies with food-processing how module C unpacks sector-specific production activities into the main business functions and the technologies that can be used to accomplish them.<sup>10</sup> Once we have identified the key business functions and relevant technologies, we use experts’ advice to construct measures of technology use at the business function level that go beyond reporting the presence of a given technology. Specifically, sector experts provided information on two key aspects. First, they ranked the technologies in each business functions according to their sophistication.<sup>11</sup> Second, they assessed the degree of substitutability or

> 8The ten sectors for which we have developed sector-specific modules are: agriculture (crops and fruits), livestock, food processing, wearing apparel, automotive, pharmaceutical, retail and wholesale, banking services, land transport services, and health services.

> 9The external experts in agriculture and livestock were agricultural engineers and researchers from Embrapa-Brazil. For food processing, wearing apparel, automotive, pharmaceutical, transport, finance, and retail, as well as for the GBFs, we relied on senior external consultants selected by a large management consulting organization. For health, the team relied on consultants and physicians with practical experience in developing countries and advanced economies.

> 10The Appendix B contains the charts for the other nine SSBFs including agriculture-crops (Figure B.1), livestock (Figure B.2), wearing apparel (Figure B.3), automotive (Figure B.4), pharmaceutical (Figure B.5), wholesale and retail (Figure B.6), transportation (Figure B.7), financial services (Figure B.8), health services (Figure B.9), and other manufacturing (Figure B.10).

11 Sophistication was defined along several dimensions: quality of the output, productivity, costs, and complexity of operation.

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