92002E2464

WRITTEN QUESTION E-2464/02

by Christopher Huhne (ELDR) to the Commission

(4 September 2002)

Subject: Trade figures

Further to the Commission's answer to questions E-0992/02 to E-0994/02 and E-1106/02(1), will the Commission state whether it has asked the European Central Bank for permission so that Eurostat may publish the figures for trade in goods and services? If not, will it do so promptly?

Does it agree that the collection and publication of figures is a public good, and should not be unnecessarily complicated for users by the precise public institution collecting those figures?

(1) OJ C 205 E, 29.8.2002, p. 244.

Joint answerto Written Questions E-2464/02 and E-2465/02given by Mr Solbes Mira on behalf of the Commission

(11 October 2002)

Further to its answer to written questions E-0992/02 to E-0994/02 and E-1106/02 by the Honourable Member, the Commission has frequent contacts with the European Central Bank (ECB) on data dissemination and the ECB does not intend to publish the Balance of Payments (BOP) data of the Member States with the extra Euro-zone used to compile the Euro-zone aggregate. Moreover, data on BOP transactions between members of the Euro-zone one are not a primary concern to the ECB. Following the request of the Honourable Member, the Commission has contacted the European Central Bank on the public dissemination of individual Member States data. The ECB confirmed its former position.

Also the Commission does not intend to publish these data, although for different reasons. The Commission agrees with the principle that statistics collected are a public good and should be disseminated. However, the Commission considers not every data collected nationally for the purpose of creating an European aggregate to be of public interest. This is the case for the data used as input for the Euro-zone aggregates of the balance of payments. As Member States produce and publish their own balance of payments data using a methodology (principle of origin) different from the one used for creating the European aggregate (principle of consignment), the public user might be confused by two sets of data whose differences are difficult to interpret.

Nevertheless, in order to satisfy the present demand, the Commission has agreed with some Member States to provide these data. The Honourable Member will find them enclosed. It should be stressed again that these data are used by Eurostat to compile the Community's Balance of Payments. They are different from the national data Member States disseminate to the public. However, they are fully compatible with the aggregate Community's Balance of Payments published by Eurostat.

Finally, the 2001 data with a detailed geographical breakdown are not yet available, and will be available by the end of October 2002. The provisional 2001 data for the Union with partners World, Extra-EU 15, Intra-EU 15, United States, Japan and Canada were published in July 2002 (statistics in focus 34/2002) and in New Cronos, and is sent direct to the Honourable Member and to Parliament's Secretariat.