International trade in goods - Reports on quality
EU Member States provide the Commission (Eurostat) with reports on the quality of data transmitted on the base of Article 12 – Statistical quality of the Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 on European statistics (which was amended by Regulation (EU) No 2015/759).
Specific requirements for European statistics on international trade in goods are laid down in sectoral legislation, namely by Regulation (EU) 2019/2152 on European statistics and Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/1197 laying down technical specifications and adaptation under Regulation (EU) 2019/ 2152. The statistics is also based on instructions and manuals.
Cross border movements of goods
Starting with June 2015, Eurostat presents regularly every two years a compliance assessment report to the ITGS Steering Group. At its December 2018 meeting, the Steering Group was submitted for the first time a compliance report extended to the assessment of the recommendations endorsed via the Compilers guide on European ITGS. Taking into account comments formulated by the countries, it was finally decided to move the assessment of the recommendations to a new report focusing on quality.
Compared with the 2020 quality report, the geographical coverage was extended to the enlargement countries in relevant tables. It should also be noted that the United Kingdom is no longer included as a reporting country. In terms of quality indicators, the report now contains information on the errors found in monthly detailed data as well as with the shares of estimates both in the first and the latest deliveries of detailed data.
Cross border movements of goods - trade according to the trade enterprise characteristics (TEC)
International Trade in Goods Statistics (ITGS) play an essential role in the assessment of any economy. When combined with other information from other sources, especially business statistics, it significantly enriches them, providing a closer view of traders and their characteristics, such as size, sector of economic activity or level of concentration. This enables a deeper analysis of the impact of trade on employment, production and value added, which is essential in a globalized world where economies are increasingly interconnected.
A new statistical area to find out what kind of enterprises are behind trade flows began to develop in 2005. Trade by Enterprise Characteristics (TEC) data describe trade in goods between countries from the perspective of enterprises. TEC focuses primarily on connecting the two main statistical areas, which have traditionally been compiled and used separately. It aims to complement the traditional ITGS by changing the perspective from products to traders and the applying business statistics concepts and definitions.
For this purpose, trade in goods between countries is broken down by economic activity, size class of enterprises, trade concentration geographical diversification and products traded. The new information is then used to carry out more sophisticated types of analysis, e.g. to assess the role of European companies in the context of globalization or to assess the effects of international trade in goods on employment, production and value added.
Cross border movements of goods - trade by invoicing currency (TIC)
European ITGS statistics are compiled on the basis of terms and definitions set out in EU legislation and are the official harmonized source of information on exports, imports and trade balance of the EU, its member states and the euro area. It serves the needs of many people and a variety of users, including governments, businesses, EU academics and researchers, and the general public. The growing interest in timely and high-quality statistics on trade in goods has made the harmonization of statistical compilation practices among EU member states a primary necessity.
Trade data by invoicing currency (TIC) is a part of the information available for non-EU trade. The invoicing currency is the currency in which the commercial invoice is issued. In general, one can use exports and imports expressed as shares of the invoicing currency, examine the role of each currency in invoicing compared to its role in global trade, and analyse the stability of invoicing currencies over time. In the context of the EU, this data allows the role of the euro to be examined both within the euro area and within the EU, while at the international level it allows the importance of the euro against the US dollar (USD) to be assessed. As trade data by invoicing currency are reported as well by EFTA and enlargement countries, they enable also to study to which extent the euro is used as a vehicle currency by non-EU countries.
These statistics are very useful for central banks, including the European Central Bank, to compare the euro with other major international currencies. These data are also used by financial market segments or foreign investors.
Reports on quality on Eurostat webpage: