Dificultades en la diferenciación de la superdotación y el talento y

definitions, information not reported to the administra- tion (the non-observed economy) and changes in legis- lation that affect the comparability of the data. Again indicators have to be used for an accurate description of the (regional) economy.

By the end of this paragraph we have to stress that this manual is limited to the concept of accuracy as used in the Eurostat quality reports (see par. 1.7). In these quality reports accuracy is one of the principal aspects of quality. Other aspects, such as timeliness and punctuality, accessi- bility and clarity, comparability, coherence and complete- ness also play an important role in the quality reports, but these aspects have been left aside in the process tables.

4.2. Applying the production and/or

income approach

GVA by industry can be estimated in two ways (see par. 3.2.1): the output and the income approaches. The two methods lead to the same GVA and both methods are gener- ally applied at the national level. The output and income measures of GVA by industry at national level can be used together in Supply and Use tables to validate each other. Both approaches can also be used for regional accounts by industry. Ideally two estimates would be calculated inde- pendently and the results used together. In practice Member States only have regional data for one set of estimates. Most Member States use an output method supplemented with the income method for general government, the health industry and some service industries for which little output data are available.

The income and production approaches can be used in combination with the various bottom-up and top-down methods discussed in par. 3.3. There is no obligation for Member States to adopt the same approach. The choice depends mainly on the statistical sources available and methods should be designed to make the best possible use of whatever detailed regional data exist.

1. For the production approach output (basic prices) and intermediate consumption (purchasers’ prices) should be available.

2. For the income approach, the following components and sub-components should be estimated separately wher- ever possible:

a. Compensation of employees: — Wages and salaries.

— Employers’ social contributions. b. Gross operating surplus (GOS):

— Net operating surplus of corporations.

— Net mixed income of unincorporated enterprises.

— Net operating surplus from owner-occupied dwellings.

— Consumption of fixed capital.

c. Other taxes less subsidies on production.

4.3. The choice of indicators in the case

of multiregional KAUs, ancillary units and

units without permanent labour

4.3.1. Value added of ancillary units of a multiregional enterprise

No delivery of ancillary output between local KAUs is recorded, unless it is observable (see ESA 2010, par. 1.31 and 13.22). This implies that the outputs of ancillary units are only recorded as far as this is practised in the national accounts. If output of an ancillary unit is recorded, the main rule in national accounts is that ‘output of the ancillary unit may be estimated by summing costs’ (ESA 2010, par. 1.31 and 13.23). It may be unlikely that the ancillary unit, as local unit, will be distinguished. This doubt is based on the regu- lation regarding the business register (No 177/2008). This regulation states in the Annex that the stratification char- acteristic ‘Activity carried out in the local unit constituting an ancillary activity of the enterprise to which it belongs’ is optional. Therefore this information may not be available in a systematic and organised way.

The rule of summing costs (ESA 2010, par. 1.31 and 13.23) implies that information should be made available about compensation of employees, consumption of fixed capital and other taxes less subsidies on production.

We can now distinguish the following situations:

1. An ancillary unit is a local unit which resides in a region different from the regions where the production units reside. Information about the ancillary unit is available in the national accounts. This implies that information is also available for the regional accounts. In this case we can apply the bottom-up method with exactly the same valuation of output and intermediate consumption as in the national accounts. This can be labelled as an A-method.

2. An ancillary unit is a local unit which resides in a region different from the regions where the production units reside. Information about the ancillary unit is however not available in the national accounts. This case is more complicated, for in the national accounts no separate estimate has been made for the output of the ancillary unit. In this case we have to solve the contradiction that, according to ESA 2010, par. 3.13, we have to allocate ancillary activities to the ‘region where the ancillary activities are situated’ and at the same time we have to fulfil the condition that the regional accounts variables

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General principles and methods for the compilation of regional GVA by industry and regional GDP

have to add up to the corresponding national totals (see ESA 2010, par. 13.02).

I. The scenario in which the national accounts estimate is based on all local units, excluding the ancillary unit, with available information about output, intermediate consumption, compensation of employees, consump- tion of fixed capital (CFC) and the balancing items GVA and net operating surplus (NOS), is shown in Table 1. For the ancillary unit, information is only available about compensation of employees, hours worked and an estimate for CFC, which plays a role because of its importance as part of GVA. Interme- diate consumption by the ancillary unit is already allocated to the production units. According to ESA 2010, par. 13.23 NOS is by definition zero. The costs of the ancillary unit serve the production processes of the production units in the other regions, by which intermediate consumption of the production units will be increased. Hours worked of employees of the production units have been used to allocate the sum of costs to the regions of the production units. It might be assumed that the ancillary activities mainly involve activities, such as accounting, data processing, maintenance, purchasing, distribution etc., which are strongly related to the number of hours worked of employees. This is a pseudo-bottom-up method with a top-down element for the regional allocation of the sum of the costs of the ancillary unit, which would be labelled an A-method.

II. For GVA of the ancillary unit, the same situation

results when the output of the ancillary unit (160) is estimated as the sum of the costs, in our example compensation of employees (150) and consumption of fixed capital (10). The estimated output of the ancillary unit has to be allocated to the production units, using the same regional distribution key as in scenario I. As a consequence, the corrected output and interme- diate consumption of the enterprise differs from the originally estimated data, while the estimate of total GVA of the enterprise remains unchanged (see Table 2). Regional GOS will be compiled as the difference between the corrected regional GVA and the sum of compensation of employees and other taxes less subsi- dies on production per region.

This method for the estimation of regional GVA will be an A-method, as in the first scenario. However, two remarks have to be made.

1. Firstly, output and intermediate consumption do not add up to the national accounts totals, if the national accounts estimates are directly based on the SBS. This may pose problems where output and intermediate consumption are grossed up to the corresponding national accounts totals. If this is the case, method I is preferred.

2. Secondly, the compilation of GVA in prices of the previous year favours the double deflation method, for which correct data for output and intermediate consumption are necessary. In this case, method I is again preferred.

The examples I and II are a simplification of reality because other taxes less subsidies on production are not taken into account. However, including these taxes and subsidies will not fundamentally change the method.

Scenarios I and II will probably almost never occur and might be described as the ideal situation. They might however serve as a benchmark for situations in which less favourable data are available.

III. The main problem is that, for the ancillary units, data are generally only collected for compensation of employees and employment, as is generally the case for local KAUs of a multiregional enterprise or KAU (number of employees or hours worked). This implies for the ancillary unit a lack of data for output and intermediate consumption, and probably also for CFC and NOS. With the absence of regional data for the previously mentioned variables, a solution for esti- mating GVA of the ancillary unit might be the adop- tion of a combination of the income approach and top- down method.

So, we need at least the regional distribution of compensa- tion of employees and of national gross operating surplus (GOS). The regional distribution of compensation of employees is generally available and the regional distribu- tion of GOS is generally not available. Therefore the focus is on which regional indicators should be applied to GOS where no direct regional indicators are available. Table 3 provides a possible solution.

GVA of the ancillary unit may be estimated by summing compensation of employees of the ancillary unit and CFC of the ancillary unit. By definition NOS is zero. It is essen- tial that an estimate of CFC of the ancillary unit should be made. The main reason is that the share of CFC in GVA of the ancillary unit generally differs largely from the share of CFC of the production units. One should try to avoid over or under estimation of GVA for the ancillary unit. The next step is to allocate GOS (excluding GOS of the ancillary unit) to the production units in the different regions.

The regional distribution of compensation of employees might be a suitable indicator if the share of compensation of employees in GVA is similar across different regions. If this is the case and a separate estimate for CFC has been made for the ancillary unit, this method may be classified as a B-method.

Where no separate estimate can be made for CFC of the ancillary unit and an indicator has to be used such as the number of employees or hours worked of employees, this

General principles and methods for the compilation of regional GVA by industry and regional GDP

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