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About SNA News and Notes
SNA News and Notes
Issue 1, February 1995
Message from the
Under-Secretary-General Jean-Claude
Milleron, Department for Economic and Social Information and Policy Analysis
(DESIPA)
Dear Colleagues,
The release of the System of National Accounts 1993 (1993 SNA) was a
further milestone towards meeting new needs for statistics and analyses
for more effective national, regional and global socio-economic policy-making
well into the next century. The revision process that culminated with
the publication of the 1993 was an example of an outstanding, decade-long,
intensive and fruitful collaboration among five international organizations
under the guidance of the United Nations Statistical Commission and the
auspices of the Inter-Secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA),
drawing on technical support and inputs from a large number of experts
with a variety of expertise, from countries in all regions of the world.
On behalf of the
ISWGNA, I would like to thank all whose efforts contributed to accomplish
this highly technical work. In view of this positive experience with the
revision of the SNA, I trust that work on its implementation will be as
successful and carried out in the same cooperative spirit. To help facilitate
this, I am happy to introduce the first issue of SNA News and Notes,
I expect this to be an important medium to make the implementation phase
of the SNA transparent and interactive, and I hope that it will be valuable
not only for national accountants in their efforts to implement the SNA,
but also in initiating and facilitating a dialogue between the producers
and the users of national accounts statistics.
What is ISWGNA?
Many major economic and social developments had occurred since the last
version of the SNA was published in 1968. Furthermore, the SNA has been
increasingly recognized as the framework for statistical systems and as
the basis for international standards for both developing and developed
countries as well as for countries in transition. This led in 1983 to
the mandate by the UN Statistical Commission to update and clarify the
1968 SNA and to harmonize it further with other international statistical
standards, while maintaining the proven strength of the former SNA. Consequently,
the Inter-Secretariat Working Group on National Accounts (ISWGNA) was
created and entrusted with the planning, organization and coordination
of the SNA review and revision process. The five member organizations
that constitute the ISWGNA (European union, International Monetary Fund,
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, United Nations
through its Statistics Division and Regional Commissions, and World Bank)
have worked together over the past decade in the development of the conceptual
framework of the 1993 SNA through an unprecedented programme of international
cooperation and burden-sharing that led them to co-authoring the 1993
SNA.
Now that the 1993
SNA has been published, pursuant to the recommendation of the 27th session
of the UN Statistical Commission and the UN Economic and Social Council
resolution 1993/5, national and international statistical services are
faced with the challenge of designing strategies for the rapid and full
implementation of the 1993 SNA. It has been recognized that the scope
and pace of the implementation of the 1993 SNA must be decided by each
country according to its own analytical and policy needs, the current
state of its basic data and the resources available for implementation.
Consequently, the
ISWGNA, following the same cooperative and coordination arrangements that
so successfully governed the SNA revision process, will now focus on how
best to assist countries in implementing the 1993 SNA. For this purpose,
it has agreed on developing and coordinating a support system that includes
four key elements:
- Meetings, training
seminars and workshops in national accounts and related subjects;
- Manuals, handbooks,
compilation guides and training materials for use in national accounts
courses and software in support of national accounts compilation;
- Research activities
designed to support future conceptual development of national and satellite
accounting and also to resolve conceptual and practical problems in
implementing the new system including the development of case-laws interpretations
of the SNA in response to queries; and
- Technical cooperation
activities in individual countries.
To facilitate its work,
the ISWGNA has decided to combine a rotating annual chairmanship with a
permanent secretariat. The IMF recently took the chair from the OECD, and
in June 1994 the secretariat was assigned to UNSD. The secretariat, among
other functions, will prepare, monitor and update directories on: SNA meetings
and seminars, SNA training materials, SNA Handbooks, studies dealing with
SNA concepts and further research into those concepts, etc. that would serve
the ISWGNA to identify both overlaps between activities that should be avoided
and omitted activities that should be incorporated and assumed by one of
the member organizations as part of its responsibilities. In the long run,
it will also prepare and maintain documentation related to the revision
and implementation of the SNA which could be accessed electronically.
Spirit of SNA News and Notes
The new version of the SNA was a result of the team work of various experts
in many fields of statistics. It could not have been accomplished without
this open interdisciplinary discussion. This spirit of openness should
be kept alive now that the 1993 SNA enters the challenging new phase of
its implementation. SNA News and Notes is meant to be an important forum
of information and dialogue between experts from various fields, especially
between the ISWGNA and statisticians and analysts worldwide. In particular
it should "keep all countries informed of new developments, experiences
gained in the course of implementation, seminars and workshops and other
matters" (Statistical Commission, Report on the Special Session, 11-15
April 1994, E/1994/29, E/CN.3/1994/18).
SNA News and
Notes will have a broad orientation: It will not only deal with national
accounting in the restricted sense, but also with satellite accounting
and related fields of data compilation, as well as with the links between
national accounting and analysis. It will be open for contributions by
international and regional organizations, but may also include information
on specific developments in selected countries or regions.
It is intended to
provide information on the most recent implementation activities and topics
subdivided into three major sections as follows:
- The first is meetings
and seminars which may include information on training courses,
conferences or expert group meetings in the field of national accounts
and related fields.
- The second is manuals
and handbooks which may also include information on training
and other materials; including not only printed documents but also materials
incorporated in new media such as CD-ROM or videos.
- The third major
section presents feature articles on selected topics
covering conceptual developments, practical issues of compilation, brief
reports of meetings on these matters, reports of country experiences,
etc. In this first issue, country experiences of USA and Netherlands
on national and environmental accounting are described.
Through its feature articles
the newsletter may serve as an important forum for the dissemination and
exchange of information on conceptual and practical issues of implementation.
The ISWGNA has established a mechanism to respond to queries about SNA implementation
matters. Therefore, if you encounter any problems in interpreting any definition
of a concept or meet a specific problem in measuring such concepts, please
let us know. As the secretariat of the ISWGNA, we will immediately consult
other members or other concerned experts and respond to the issue. If important
enough, we may also publish the response to your query in one of the next
issues of SNA News and Notes. We would also like to encourage readers
to suggest any other topics for feature articles. The newsletter is not
restricted to specific opinions; alternative approaches are encouraged since
articles published under the name of an author will not necessarily represent
the official opinion of the international organization or country institution
for which the author works.
The newsletter will
be disseminated biannually primarily to all statistical offices, but also
to concerned users such as ministries and central banks policy makers
as well as researchers and analysts; universities, institutes and other
interested persons and organizations will be gradually included as subscribers
of the newsletter. All interested readers are encouraged to send us their
mailing address. Any comments or suggestions should be sent to the address
listed in the editorial note.
Implementation of
the 1993 SNA in the United States by
J. Steven Landefeld, United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic
Analysis
The Bureau of Economic
Analysis (BEA) is testing accounts patterned after the 1993 SNA for several
segments of the US national income and product accounts (NIPA's). Perhaps
the area of greatest difference between the NIPA's and the SNA is in their
treatments of government and non-profit institutions serving households.
Issues involved in moves toward the SNA treatments were discussed at two
user conferences. BEA then prepared, jointly with the section of the Federal
Reserve that prepares the US financial accounts, detailed estimates of
the government sector on a SNA basis and presented the results at the
1994 IARIW conference. Some changes in government transactions are being
considered for implementation in the late-1995 "benchmark" revision of
the NIPA's. Parallel work on non-profit institutions is proceeding, based
largely on a newly acquired data base of tax returns.
Modernization teams
are also developing proposals in two other areas of difference between
the NIPA's and the SNA: Measures of household income and the treatment
of private insurance companies and pension funds. Other changes required
because the 1993 SNA expanded the asset boundary by including computer
software and other items are being explored. In particular, BEA is now
assessing data sources for computer software.
In conjunction with
the revision of the IMF's Balance of Payments Manual, BEA has been modernizing
its international accounts. The few remaining changes necessary to bring
the US accounts into agreement with the IMF's recommendations are being
studied, including changes to the source data surveys.
Finally, the 1993
SNA includes provisions for satellite accounts. BEA has published two
exploratory projects: one on integrated economic and environmental accounts
and the other on the production of R&D, including the resulting stocks
that are consistent with treating R&D expenditures as capital formation.
Environmental accounting
in The Netherlands by
Steven J. Keuning, Head of the Department for National Accounts, Statistics
Netherlands
The 1993 SNA's chapter
on satellite accounting refers to the further elaboration of a System
of integrated Environmental and Economic Accounting (SEEA) and suggests
that such system may be elaborated in the form of a SAM-based approach.
In developing environmental
accounting in the Netherlands, Statistics Netherlands took these SNA recommendations
as a point of departure. It developed a Dutch environmental module, or
NAMEA as it is usually called, in which an existing National Accounts
Matrix has been extended with Environmental Accounts in physical units.
First, for each economic activity an overview is given of the emission
of pollutants such as carbon dioxide, CFCs, nitrogen oxides, ammonia,
phosphorus and waste. These pollutants are subsequently grouped by a number
of environmental problems which they cause. On the basis of the contribution
of each substance to the problem concerned, the emissions are converted
into theme units. This results in five summary environment indicators.
The satellite accounts contain consistent data for the economy and the
environment, so that summary economic and environment indicators can be
based on one meso-level information system. This statistical framework
is also applicable in models, and may thus serve as a basis for forecasts,
policy simulations and retrospective Green GDP estimates. Besides, the
system can easily be extended to incorporate, e.g., (un)employment and
social indicators.
NAMEA's for the period
1989–1991 have now been completed and included in the regular Netherlands
national accounts' publication. These NAMEA's have been extended from
a pilot version by showing the depletion of two important mineral resources,
a more detailed industrial classification, and a list of environment taxes
and levies and other expenditure on account of the environment by industry
and households. Because a time-series is now available, changes in economic
and environmental variables can be juxtaposed. One result is for example
that the emissions causing some main environmental problems in the Netherlands
have on average decreased or increased significantly less than the Gross
Domestic Product (GDP).
In December 1994,
an official communication of the Commission of the European Communities
to the Council of the European Parliament proposed to establish "... a
European System of Integrated Economic and Environmental Indices. The
system—which will resemble the Dutch NAMEA system, but will be developed
using a common European System of Environmental Pressure Indices—will
be available to Member States and the EU in 2–3 years time. It will need
permanent updating."
References to the 1993 SNA
One question raised many times is how to make reference to the new SNA.
Within a text it became common to use the terms "1993 SNA", "1968 SNA"
or "System". However, when referring to the publication, it is proposed
to make a proper reference by listing all concerned agencies as follows:
Commission of the European Communities, International Monetary Fund, Organisation
for Economic Co-operation and Development, United Nations, World Bank:
System of National Accounts 1993, Brussels / Luxembourg, New York, Paris,
Washington, D.C., 1993.
The 1993 SNA - a bestseller
Brisk sales are making the System of National Accounts 1993 a bestseller
for both UN and OECD publications offices. United Nations Publications
office reports that it will be one of its 1994 top five bestsellers, with
6,000 copies in projected sales at the end of the year, equalling in one
year the total sales over 25 years of the SNA.
How to order the
1993 SNA?
The 1993 SNA can be
obtained from any of the five co-authoring organizations. The United Nations
Publications office can be reached as follows: For sales in North and
South America, Asia and the Pacific:
United Nations Publications,
2 United Nations
Plaza, Room DC2-853, Dept. 038D,
New York, NY 10017,
Tel.: 1 (212) 963-8302, 1 (800) 253-9646,
Fax: 1 (212) 963-3489.
For sales in Europe,
Africa and Middle East:
United Nations Publications,
CH-1211 Geneva 10, Switzerland,
Telephone 41 (22) 9172786,
Fax 41 (22) 9170027.
The UN sales number
of the 1993 SNA is E.94.XVII.4. Credit cards are welcome.
The other offices
of the ISWGNA members and the respective sales numbers of the 1993 SNA
are: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, Catalog
number CA-81-93-002-EN-C; International Monetary Fund, Publication Stock
No. SNA-EA; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD
Code 30 94 01 1; World Bank Stock Number: 31512.
SNA on diskettes and CD-ROM
The ISWGNA is studying the feasibility of publishing a CD-ROM version
of the 1993 SNA in 1995. More precise information will be announced in
the next SNA News and Notes.
Translations of the 1993 SNA
The 1993 SNA will be published in all six official languages of the United
Nations. Translations into the other five official languages started as
soon as the final English manuscript was ready. Responsibility for the
final translations has been distributed among the ISWGNA member organizations
as follows:
- Arabic, ESCWA in
cooperation with UNSD;
- Chinese, UNSD;
- French, Eurostat
in cooperation with INSEE, France;
- Russian, IMF;
- Spanish, ECLAC
in cooperation with INE, Spain.
The expected publication
dates by the United Nations are as follows:
- Arabic, early 1996;
- Chinese, early
1996;
- French, April 1996;
- Russian, November
1995;
- Spanish, mid-1996.
Meetings and seminars
A joint OECD-ECE
Meeting of National Accounts Experts was held in Geneva
from 27–29 April 1994 and another joint meeting will be organized from 9
to 12 May 1995 in Paris. These meetings focus on practical problems in the
implementation of the 1993 SNA.
Two Sub-regional
Seminars on the 1993 SNA were organized by ESCAP, one in Canberra,
Australia, from 5 to 16 September 1994, for countries of the Pacific and
Maldives, and one in Bangkok, Thailand, from 20 to 30 September 1994,
for countries in Asia, other than Central Asia.
A seminar on the
Use of the SNA in Transition Economy Countries was organized
by UNSD and OECD in St. Petersburg, Russia, from 25 to 28 October 1994.
A workshop on Implementation
of SNA/ESA in Transition Economies was organized by Eurostat
in Warsaw, Poland, from 21 to 25 November 1994.
A workshop on the
Compilation of Quarterly National Accounts was organized
by Eurostat in Paris, France, from 5 to 6 December 1994. A draft handbook
will be prepared and will be circulated for comments at the end of 1995.
The first meeting
of the Expert Group on International Classifications
was organized by UNSD in New York, from 6 to 8 December 1994.
Two courses on the
Application of the Revised ESA were organized by Eurostat
in Bordeaux, France, from 12 to 15 December 1994 and in Munich, Germany,
from 6 to 9 February 1995.
A Workshop
on the 1993 SNA was organized by ESCWA in Amman, Jordan, from
12 to 19 December 1994.
The first interregional
seminar on the 1993 SNA in Concept and Practice was organized
by UNSD in New York, from 23 January to1 February 1995.
Manuals and handbooks
The fifth edition of
the Balance of Payments Manual was published by the IMF
in September 1993.
The Handbook
on Integrated Environmental and Economic Accounting was published
by UNSD in December 1993 (ST/ESA/STAT/SER.F/61, UN publication, Sales
No. E.93.XVII.12).
Balance of Payments Compilation Guide will be published by the IMF in
early 1995.
A draft Handbook
on SNA for Transition Economies was recently prepared by UNSD
and circulated for comments. UNSD, in close cooperation with OECD and
IMF is planning to finalize this handbook during the first half of 1995.
A draft technical
report Towards a Methodology for the Compilation of National Accounts:
Concepts and Practice was prepared by UNSD and circulated for
comments in December 1994. After incorporation of all comments received,
UNSD is planning to submit it for publication in summer 1995.
The third edition
of the European System of Account in the eleven official
languages of the European Communities was recently prepared by Eurostat
and the NSIs. Eurostat is planning to submit it for publication during
the second half of 1995.
During 1995, OECD
plans to publish three manuals on national accounting. These deal with:
accounting for inflation, with special attention to problems created by
very high inflation, methods used by OECD member countries to compile
quarterly national accounts, and methods used by OECD Member countries
to calculate value added in service activities at constant prices.
Editorial note
SNA
News and Notes is a bi-annual information service of the ISWGNA prepared
by the Statistics Division of the United Nations (UNSD). The member organizations
that constitute the ISWGNA are
- European Union,
- International Monetary
Fund,
- Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development,
- United Nations
Statistics Division and Regional Commissions, and
- World Bank.
SNA News and Notes
does not necessarily express the official position of any of the members
of the ISWGNA. For further details on the agenda
of ISWGNA and the spirit of the newsletter
see issue 1 of SNA News and Notes. For any further information
on SNA News and Notes contact:
Statistics Division
Economic Statistics Branch
United Nations
Room DC2-1720
New York, NY 10017, U.S.A.
Fax: +1-212-963-1374
E-Mail: sna@un.org
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