Environmental protection expenditure accounts: documentation of statistics
Basic data of the statistics
Data description
Statistical population
Statistical unit
Unit of measure
Reference period
Reference area
Sector coverage
The statistics on environmental protection expenditure accounts comprise:
- investments in environmental protection
- expenditure arising from the operations and maintenance of environmental protection equipment
Time coverage
Frequency of dissemination
Concepts
CEPA-classification
Environment
Environmental protection
Environmental protection expenditure
Environmental protection investments
Final consumption of environmental protection services
Final consumption of EP services by households (ESA 2010, § 3.95) consists of expenditure incurred by households on the purchases of EP services. This is consumption to satisfy their individual needs. It includes households’ “payments for non-market output” i.e. their payments of various fees and charges that represent less than 50% of the costs of production of the non-market EP services. The final consumption expenditure of households is recorded at purchaser's prices.
In national accounts, the consumption of products for the benefit of the community at large e.g., public administration, justice services, defence services, etc. is conventionally attributed to the general government. This is the final consumption by the general government. Those services are typically produced by the government itself, so they can be identified and measured from the production side.
Correspondingly, final consumption expenditure of EP services by general government and NPISH (ESA 2010, §§ 3.97, 3.98 and 3.117) is equal to the value of their non-market output less payments for non-market output.
Full-time producers of environmental protection services
Intermediate consumption of environmental protection expenditure
For example, self-used environmental production includes use of energy and materials, wages and salaries, service operations, etc.
NEEP = National expenditure on environmental protection
• total output (environmental protection market output, environmental protection non-market output and environmental protection ancillary output),
• plus gross fixed capital formation (GFCF) and net acquisition of non-financial, non-produced assets for environmental protection,
• minus intermediate consumption of environmental protection services by corporations as specialist producers.
This is an indirect, supply-side estimate of expenditure. The imports, exports and international transfers of environmental protection services, as well as the VAT and other taxes less subsidies on environmental protection services, are not (yet) estimated due to incomplete data sources. It is assumed that these components have a small impact on the total national expenditure of the EU-28 as a whole. Work is ongoing to improve the estimates of national expenditure on environmental protection.
Output of environmental protection services
System of Integrated Environmental and Economic Accounting (SEEA)
Accuracy, reliability and timeliness
Overall accuracy
In other respects, the statistics comprise statistics derived from other sources. Therefore, the quality of the source statistics is crucial for the reliability of the statistics.
Timeliness
Punctuality
Comparability
Comparability - geographical
Comparability - over time
Coherence - cross domain
Coherence -national accounts
Coherence - internal
Source data and data collections
Source data
Data collection
Frequency of data collection
Methods
Data compilation
Data validation
Principles and outlines
Contact organisation
Contact organisation unit
Economic Statistics
Legal acts and other agreements
The compilation of statistics is guided by the Statistics Act. The Statistics Act contains provisions on collection of data, processing of data and the obligation to provide data. Besides the Statistics Act, the Data Protection Act and the Act on the Openness of Government Activities are applied to processing of data when producing statistics.
Statistics Finland compiles statistics in line with the EU’s regulations applicable to statistics, which steer the statistical agencies of all EU Member States.
Further information: Statistical legislation
Confidentiality - policy
The data protection of data collected for statistical purposes is guaranteed in accordance with the requirements of the Statistics Act (280/2004), the Act on the Openness of Government Activities (621/1999), the EU's General Data Protection Regulation (EU) 2016/679 and the Data Protection Act (1050/2018). The data materials are protected at all stages of processing with the necessary physical and technical solutions. Statistics Finland has compiled detailed directions and instructions for confidential processing of the data. Employees have access only to the data essential for their duties. The premises where unit-level data are processed are not accessible to outsiders. Members of the personnel have signed a pledge of secrecy upon entering the service. Violation of data protection is punishable.
Further information: Data protection | Statistics Finland (stat.fi)
Confidentiality - data treatment
The tables in the statistics are produced by using/editing a table’s classification on a level high or general enough to prevent the emergence of small cell frequencies.
The Statistics Act (280/2004) defines the data on the number of enterprises as being in the public domain, which is why even small cell frequencies do not need to be protected. In quantity tables, cells containing only a small number of observations (threshold value) or dominated by one or two units (dominance rule) are protected by suppressing the value of the cell to prevent the data of an individual enterprise being revealed. In addition, other cells have been suppressed to prevent the calculation of the primarily suppressing cell values with the aid of marginal sums. The suppressed cells in released tables are marked by single quotation marks ’..’. Further information on suppression can be found in the Handbook on Statistical Disclosure Control (2010).
The data of the statistics are not released in an identifiable format outside Statistics Finland. The use of the data for scientific research and statistical surveys is possible only on the basis of a separate licensing decision and in an unidentifiable format. Further information about licences.
Release policy
Statistics Finland publishes new statistical data at 8 am on weekdays in its web service. The release times of statistics are given in advance in the release calendar available in the web service. The data are public after they have been updated in the web service.
Further information: Publication principles for statistics at Statistics Finland
Data sharing
Accessibility and clarity
Statistical data are published as database tables in the StatFin database. The database is the primary publishing site of data, and new data are updated first there. When releasing statistical data, existing database tables can be updated with new data or completely new database tables can be published.
In addition to statistical data published in the StatFin database, a release on the key data is usually published in the web service. If the release contains data concerning several reference periods (e.g. monthly and annual data), a review bringing together these data is published in the web service. Database tables updated at the time of publication are listed both in the release and in the review. In some cases, statistical data can also be published as mere database releases in the StatFin database. No release or review is published in connection with these database releases.
Releases and database tables are published in three languages, in Finnish, Swedish and English. The language versions of releases may have more limited content than in Finnish.
Information about changes in the publication schedules of releases and database tables and about corrections are given as change releases in the web service.
https://www.stat.fi/til/ympsm/index_en.html
Release of topical news (such as news contents) is decided on a case-by-case basis. The channels for the news are
www.stat.fi
www.facebook.com/Tilastotohtori
https://twitter.com/StatsFinland
Data revision - policy
Revisions – i.e. improvements in the accuracy of statistical data already published – are a normal feature of statistical production and result in improved quality of statistics. The principle is that statistical data are based on the best available data and information concerning the statistical phenomenon. On the other hand, the revisions are communicated as transparently as possible in advance. Advance communication ensures that the users can prepare for the data revisions.
The reason why data in statistical releases become revised is often caused by the data becoming supplemented. Then the new, revised statistical figure is based on a wider information basis and describes the phenomenon more accurately than before.
Revisions of statistical data may also be caused by the calculation method used, such as annual benchmarking or updating of weight structures. Changes of base years and used classifications may also cause revisions to data.
Quality assessment
Quality assurance
Quality management requires comprehensive guidance of activities. The quality management framework of the field of statistics is the European Statistics Code of Practice (CoP). The quality criteria of Official Statistics of Finland are compatible with the European Statistics Code of Practice.
Further information: Quality management | Statistics Finland (stat.fi)
User access
Data are released to all users at the same time. Statistical data may only be handled at Statistics Finland and information on them may be given before release only by persons involved in the production of the statistics concerned or who need the data of the statistics concerned in their own work before the data are published.
Further information: Publication principles for statistics
Unless otherwise separately stated in connection with the product, data or service concerned, Statistics Finland is the producer of the data and the owner of the copyright. The terms of use for statistical data.