EUROPEAN COMMISSION

Brussels, 24.8.2021

COM(2021) 489 final

REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL

on the implementation of Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 on Community statistics on migration and international protection

1.Introduction

Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 1  (‘the Regulation’) establishes common rules for producing European statistics on migration and international protection in the European Union (EU). These statistics cover international migration flows to, from and inside the EU, migrant population stocks in the EU as well as acquisition and loss of citizenship of an EU Member State. They also cover asylum and managed migration statistics that concern:

·asylum applications, including those by unaccompanied minors, first instance decisions and appeal decisions granting or withdrawing various forms of international protection status, and persons resettled to the EU;

·statistics on Member States’ applying the Dublin III Regulation 2 ;

·non-EU (third-country) nationals refused entry to the Member State at the external border or found to be illegally present under national immigration legislation;

·residence permits issued to third-country nationals, length of permit validity and reason (immigration category) for the permit being issued; and

·third-country nationals ordered to leave the territory of a Member State under immigration legislation or recorded as departing after the issue of such an order, disaggregated by citizenship.

Article 12 of the Regulation requires that ‘By 20 August 2012 and every three years thereafter, the Commission shall submit a report to the European Parliament and the Council on the statistics compiled pursuant to this Regulation and on their quality.’

This is the Commission’s fourth report on the implementation of the Regulation, following the reports adopted in 2012 3 , 2015 4 , and 2018 5 . It provides information on the progress that Member States, together with the Commission (Eurostat), have made to implement the Regulation since 2018 and presents the next steps to further improve the quality of these statistics. Section 2 briefly outlines the most important developments. Section 3 addresses general progress and quality aspects of statistics produced for reference periods between 2018 and 2020. Section 4 focuses on ongoing work to implement revised statistics requirements for reference periods from 2021 onwards and new initiatives to address evolving policy needs over the coming years. Section 5 concludes the report and outlines next steps.

2.Most important developments since 2018

After a period of continued improvements leading up to the previous 2018 report, general data availability and quality – in particular completeness, timeliness, comparability and accuracy – have stabilised at a high level across all data collections. However, due to the rapidly changing nature of migration, new needs have arisen in the EU for more timely and more detailed statistics on asylum, returns, resettlement and residence permits.

In May 2018, the Commission adopted a proposal for a Regulation amending the Regulation 6 to extend the data requirements on asylum and managed migration. Regulation (EU) 2020/851 7 substantially updates asylum and managed migration statistics in terms of new variables, more detailed breakdowns and more frequent data collections for reference periods from 2021 onwards. The new requirements were to be gradually introduced from that Regulation’s date of entry into force on 12 July 2020 through to 1 July 2021. In line with Article 11a of the Regulation, the Commission granted temporary derogations 8 to 16 Member States 9 upon justified requests. Eurostat will regularly monitor the progress on necessary adaptations in national production systems in affected Member States. Data availability has already improved with the release of monthly (asylum applications) and quarterly (asylum first instance decisions, returns) data from March 2021 onwards.

New requirements for mandatory data collections on asylum and managed migration must be implemented for all applicable reference periods from January 2021 onwards. To ensure a smooth process, Eurostat worked with national experts during 2020 to revise the relevant technical guidelines for data collections accordingly and, in November 2020, the Expert Group endorsed all new versions. Moreover, all production processes are being updated in line with respective timelines for the revised monthly, quarterly and annual data collections – including updated methodologies, reporting templates, data transmission procedures and formats, and validation rules.

As required by Article 9b of the Regulation, the Commission is providing financial contributions from the EU budget to support necessary development or implementation actions in Member States. The relevant instruments are grants provided by Eurostat and support under the new Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund 10 .

Furthermore, Eurostat and Member States have continued to invest in data quality and methodological improvements. Firstly, work has progressed on the misclassification of demographic events; the inclusion/exclusion of asylum seekers and refugees; cross-domain coherence between migration, asylum and residence permits data; and ensuring a consistent demographic balance. Secondly, voluntary data collections were set up to address quickly evolving policy needs and thus maintain high relevance in the short term, including data on unaccompanied minors applying for asylum, on returns by quarter, and on migration from/to the new composition of the EU following the United Kingdom’s withdrawal. Most recently, with the COVID-19 pandemic, Member States and Eurostat have ensured that data transmissions and publications respect their release calendar.

The technical improvements have helped to maintain the high relevance of statistical outputs but also to make data validation and processing more efficient. Alongside this, with the continued regular collection of extensive quality metadata it is possible to assess and monitor the quality of incoming data. When necessary, administrative letters were sent to ensure compliance with the legal obligations.

3.Quality of the statistics produced 

To disseminate these European statistics, the Commission (Eurostat) has continued to work closely with all relevant national authorities. National statistical institutes are the main suppliers of statistics on migration flows, acquisitions of citizenship and population stocks. Statistics on residence permits and asylum usually come directly from interior ministries or immigration services. Statistics on border controls and the removal of unauthorised migrants are also provided by interior ministries or immigration services, or else by police authorities.

To evaluate the quality of the incoming data, Eurostat collects extensive metadata and quality information from Member States. The resulting national metadata reports, which are public, serve as an aid for quality checks, evaluation and further improvements 11 . They help users to interpret and use the statistics correctly. In the following sections, various quality dimensions are addressed separately.

3.1.Relevance

Since the 2018 report, the data transmissions have generally remained at a very high level of completeness. Some issues nevertheless remain, mostly for statistics on Dublin procedures.

Statistics on migration and international protection are used for EU policies on migration, home affairs, employment, social affairs, justice, external relations, and human rights. The Commission relies on the data to prepare regular reports, policy proposals and implementation reports required under EU legislation and to carry out policy analysis.

For the period 2014-2020, statistics under the Regulation were used to determine budgetary allocations to Member States under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (applicants for international protection, grants of protection status, issuance of authorisations to stay for specific reasons, returns) and the Internal Security Fund – Borders and Visa (number of persons crossing external borders, third-country nationals refused entry at external borders). Similar allocation rules are envisaged again for some new EU funds during 2021-2027. National funding allocations under the new Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (see footnote 10) rely on Eurostat’s latest annual statistics (covering the preceding 3 calendar years) on persons who applied for or were granted international protection, persons resettled, number of legally residing third-country nationals, first residence permits, persons obliged to leave, and persons returned. The new Border Management and Visa Policy Instrument 12 (as part of the Integrated Border Management Fund) relies on the latest European statistics on third-country nationals refused entry at external land or sea borders or at airports.

Migration-related EU agencies such as Frontex and the European Asylum Support Office, with whom Eurostat works closely on data collection and statistical methodology, also use these statistics. Further examples are the publications of the Knowledge Centre on Migration and Demography 13 , which operates under the Commission’s Joint Research Centre, and of the European Migration Network 14 . Eurostat is a leading contributor with statistics to such publications.

Finally, regular users of the statistics include national administrations, international organisations, academic researchers and civil society groups working on a wide range of topics, including the integration of immigrants, the development and monitoring of national asylum and immigration procedures, and population and labour force projections.

3.2.Accuracy

In general, Member States are constantly maintaining or even improving statistical accuracy at a high level. Specific accuracy issues remain, however, for international migration data. These relate both to under-coverage (i.e. persons who do not register in their place of residence) and over-coverage (i.e. persons who do not deregister, as there is often no obligation or incentive to do so). To further improve accuracy in this domain, Member States exchange data with other Member States, and use estimation techniques and additional administrative data sources. Freedom of movement within the EU and issues related to personal data protection constrain further improvements in the quality of migration statistics, especially in relation to EU citizens who move and reside in another Member State.

3.3.Timeliness and punctuality

Depending on the type of data concerned, the deadline to supply data is between 2 and 12 months after the reference date or the end of the reference period. Automated extraction procedures at national level and regular monitoring by Eurostat generally ensure the punctual provision of data. In particular, data transmission deadlines are generally observed, with mostly constant or slightly improving trends since 2018, with some issues remaining only for statistics on Dublin procedures. Other non-recurring issues remain rare, for instance isolated disruptions due to staff unavailability or computing system failures. The COVID-19 pandemic did not affect the implementation of the release calendar.

3.4.Accessibility

The statistical data and metadata are freely available on Eurostat’s website under the theme Population 15 . Moreover, these statistics feature in regularly updated Statistics Explained articles 16 and in compendium publications like Key figures on Europe (2020 edition) 17 or the 2020 Report on the impact of demographic change 18 (presenting data on migration flows and population stock by citizenship).

Statistics produced under the Regulation remain among the most widely consulted European statistics. Since 2016, ‘international migration statistics’ has ranked first among the thematic sections on the website, with a constantly high user interest to this day. Similarly, on the Statistics Explained website, the rolling article on migration and migrant population statistics 19 has established itself since 2016 as one of the most visited pages. Since 2018, Eurostat has produced 42 publications on asylum and managed migration. The Statistics Explained rolling article on annual asylum statistics 20 has been highly popular with around 200 000 views per year since 2018. These statistics are also very visible in Eurostat’s social media channels.

3.5.Comparability

Methodological and compilation guidelines have long been in place and have been regularly improved for statistics on international migration, the acquisition of citizenship, asylum, the enforcement of immigration legislation, and residence permits. They help Member States to ensure comparability that is generally in accordance with EU legislation and international recommendations.

International migration statistics continue to be highly consistent with the demographic data collections covered by Regulation (EU) No 1260/2013 21 , following an agreement reached with Member States to apply the same age definitions and breakdowns, and on the definition of EU aggregates. To ensure comparability, Eurostat verifies whether the received data are consistent internally and over time, and whether they are comparable between regions and countries. Regarding comparability between countries, the Regulation establishes harmonised definitions for migration flow data. Problems applying specific definitions for the statistics on migration flows and acquisition of citizenship have been among the hardest to address. Since the 2018 report, the data sent have generally remained highly compliant for statistics on migration and acquisition of citizenship. Nevertheless, the migrant population data under the Regulation can be based on definitions of either usual residence or legal or registered residence. This flexibility is used to obtain a fully consistent set of population data at national level at the expense of reduced comparability between countries (see Section 3.6). This is one of the starting points for wider definitional and conceptual harmonisation in statistics for demography and international migration (see Section 4.2).

Regarding asylum and managed migration statistics, Member States generally have a good level of compliance with definitions. Some specific issues persist in a few Member States, but mostly at the level of breakdown sub-categories. Eurostat, in cooperation with national experts, is preparing a dedicated glossary to further harmonise these domains. This work is already very advanced, and the glossary is expected to be published in 2021.

3.6.Coherence

The Regulation leaves Member States to define the migrant population as being either usually resident or, in default, legally or registered resident. Regulation (EU) No 1260/2013 requires Member States to ensure that population data under its Article 3 are consistent with migrant population data required under Article 3(1)(c) of Regulation (EC) No 862/2007, as statisticians and demographers systematically use these population data together. However, general issues remain. For example, due to a current gap in harmonisation across legal bases, the definitions and applications of the population base between international migration flows and other demographic statistics are insufficiently coherent. This will be a crucial point when wider definitional and conceptual harmonisation in population statistics as a whole – covering census, demography and international migration – is addressed more comprehensively at EU level (see Section 4.2).

Since 2018, Eurostat has also made efforts to assess both intra-domain consistency (e.g. in asylum or residence permits domains) and cross-domain coherence (between asylum, residence permits and international migration statistics). In this work, both synergies and differences were identified between statistics on first-time residence permits issued to third-country nationals and statistics on long-term international migration of third-country nationals. More detailed findings are published in the Eurostat metadata 22 and were presented to the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) Work Session on Migration Statistics in 2018.

Where comparisons are possible, a high degree of coherence can generally be seen with data collected and published elsewhere by national and international organisations. Eurostat cooperates closely with the European Asylum Support Office and Frontex to ensure coherence of the methodology and the statistics with the methodologies applied and data collected by these agencies.

Eurostat participates in the United Nations Expert Group on Refugee and Internally Displaced Persons Statistics (EGRIS) 23 . Eurostat was one of the founders of this international expert group and remains a member of its Steering Committee. Eurostat is contributing to the group’s work not only with methodological and written contributions to the various group outputs but also administratively and financially. This group’s work led to the United Nations (UN) approving, in 2018, the International Recommendations on Refugee Statistics 24 and, in 2020, the International Recommendations on Internally Displaced Persons Statistics 25 accompanied by the Compilers’ Manual on Displacement Statistics 26 . These recommendations have set the global standards for producing statistics on forced displacement. For instance, they call for closing gaps and ensuring proper standards in statistics on forcibly displaced children, unaccompanied minors and persons with disabilities. During 2020, EGRIS also continued its work on the International Recommendations on Statelessness Statistics, scheduled for adoption by the United Nations Statistical Commission in 2022.

Eurostat is member of the UNECE Steering Group on Migration Statistics 27 and regularly participates in the UNECE Work Sessions on Migration Statistics. In this context, Eurostat has presented work on the comparability of residence permits and international migration statistics and on the production features of circular migration statistics. Eurostat has also contributed to the UNECE Guidance on Data Integration for Measuring Migration 28 and Guidance on the use of longitudinal data for migration statistics 29 . Finally, Eurostat participates in the United Nations Expert Group on Migration Statistics 30 , which is working on a revision of the UN Recommendations on Statistics of International Migration. In particular, Eurostat has contributed to discussions in the United Nations Task Force on Key Concepts and Definitions related to International Migration, whose remit covers worldwide practices in national migration statistics and exploring alternative definitions of migration.

4.Ongoing work to address current and evolving policy needs

4.1.Piloting new statistics on asylum and managed migration

In the dynamic policy environment, for instance in the wake of the New Pact on Migration and Asylum that the Commission adopted in September 2020 31 , needs for new statistics keep evolving quickly 32 . The Regulation, as amended in 2020, anticipated this to some extent by introducing in Article 9a a mechanism to pilot the collection and dissemination of new asylum and managed migration statistics. This mechanism includes two complementary approaches, namely at EU level and at national level. In line with Article 9a, Eurostat will, by July 2022, report publicly on the overall progress made.

Article 9a(2) mandates Eurostat to assess whether the new statistics can be based on information available in relevant administrative sources at EU level. The Regulation acknowledges that such EU‑level production, where possible and feasible, would benefit from more efficiency and harmonisation than new national efforts. The relevant potential EU sources in this context are developed and maintained by eu-LISA 33 . In particular, Eurostat should benefit from the central repository for reporting and statistics (CRRS) that eu‑LISA is currently developing to provide cross-system statistical data for policy purposes on the basis of anonymised data extracted from the EU large-scale IT systems 34 . Eurostat already started initial exploratory work in this direction as early as 2018, with even greater efforts since 2020 to facilitate the smoothest possible implementation of the Regulation.

Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 35 establishes a broad framework enabling such processing for statistical purposes, and Article 17a of Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 36 gives Eurostat a special EU level mandate for this. Nevertheless, the legislation currently in force governing each system operated by eu-LISA, including the CRRS, does not allow producing other statistical reports than those explicitly stated in these legal texts. This excludes a lot of relevant statistical information available in the source systems from CRRS scope and thus limits the CRRS utility far below its full potential. While the Commission as a whole will continue to explore appropriate solutions to better use these source systems for statistical purposes in the mid or long term, urgent policy needs for new statistics justify proceeding quickly in parallel with the national piloting approach.

After EU‑level assessment, according to the Regulation, Eurostat has the mandate to establish voluntary pilot studies with Member States to test the feasibility at national level of new data collections or breakdowns. Such pilot studies will cover the availability of appropriate data sources, compilation methods and techniques, statistical quality and comparability, and additional costs and burdens involved. The pilot studies need to be representative at EU level, so that Eurostat can evaluate the results at EU level with a view to considering implementing acts to regulate the respective data collections.

Eurostat launched a project to organise the piloting of new statistics. For this purpose, the policy data needs were ranked according to priority. Eurostat is currently analysing feedback from national data providers on the availability of appropriate data sources at national level. Subject to available sources and volunteering Member States, the first national pilot studies are expected to start in 2022.

4.2.Review of international migration statistics

Some data gaps exist in international migration statistics, e.g. breakdowns of population stocks by single country of citizenship, and migration by single previous/next country of residence. The timeliness and frequency of data collections is not sufficient to provide adequate information on migration related to the post-Brexit and COVID-19 situation. Insufficient geographical detail contributes to a failure to inform regional or local policies adequately. These weaknesses probably cannot be addressed by voluntary data collections. Further quality improvements are needed in the future, notably to increase timeliness, comparability and coherence, and to fill data gaps. These issues are connected to the more fundamental problem stemming from the currently separate legal bases for European statistics related to population, and the lack of an integrated approach on data requirements.

In consequence, regarding statistics on population stock and international migration, the current legal framework may have reached its limits to address the conceptual and harmonisation issues mentioned above. This is being addressed in a comprehensive and coherent future revision of the legal framework covering the population and housing census, demography and international migration statistics. A corresponding new initiative on European statistics on population 37 is currently in preparation. It will aim, subject to an evaluation and impact assessment, to modernise and integrate all relevant aspects of European population statistics into a coherent and more flexible legal framework.

This would entail some consequential amendments to the Regulation, essentially the need to repeal Article 3 on migrant population stocks and international migration statistics. As regards asylum and managed migration statistics, given the recent amendment of Articles 4 to 7 of the Regulation, continuity and stability is now needed for asylum and managed migration statistics to ensure a proper implementation with national data providers. Moreover, testing of new statistics to address emerging EU policy needs is planned.

5.Conclusions and next steps

The Regulation has clearly improved European statistics on migration and international protection. Its recent amendment has enhanced asylum and managed migration statistics, specifically on returns, resettlement, residence permits and migrant children. Furthermore, since the 2018 report, the overall quality has stabilised at a generally high level. The adoption of Regulation (EU) No 1260/2013 has also benefitted the statistical quality. The statistics produced for reference periods between 2018 and 2020 remain among the most relevant and widely used European statistics, serving EU and national policies, non-governmental bodies and the general public. Nevertheless, the Regulation’s structural limitations to respond to evolving policy needs have become more entrenched in recent years, especially for statistics on international migration flows, population stocks, and acquisitions of citizenship. It is likely that current legislation cannot address these data gaps and comparability issues.

The following actions are therefore being taken:

1.Implementation of the Regulation, as amended in 2020, i.e. the methodological and technical aspects of producing revised mandatory statistics from reference periods in 2021 onwards. This includes upgrading data sources and IT systems, with national data providers receiving appropriate financial support from the EU budget to do so over the coming years.

2.The piloting of new statistics envisaged by the Regulation to address the latest policy needs arising from the proposed New Pact on Migration and Asylum. As mandated, Eurostat is first assessing whether the new statistics can be based on information available in administrative sources at EU level, where source IT systems maintained by eu-LISA are the most relevant. In parallel, Eurostat is also establishing pilot studies and financial support at national level to address the most urgently needed new statistics.

3.Preparation of a future coherent legal framework for European population statistics in a wider context. This framework would incorporate and extend the statistics on international and intra-EU migration flows, population stocks and acquisition and loss of citizenship by ensuring reliable, detailed and comparable data on migration events, on the size, destinations and origins of migration flows, and on the demographic, migration and socio-economic characteristics of migrant populations. 38

(1)  Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 July 2007 on Community statistics on migration and international protection and repealing Council Regulation (EEC) No 311/76 on the compilation of statistics on foreign workers ( OJ L 199, 31.7.2007, p. 23 ).

(2)  Regulation (EU) No 604/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June 2013 establishing the criteria and mechanisms for determining the Member State responsible for examining an application for international protection lodged in one of the Member States by a third-country national or a stateless person ( OJ L 180, 29.6.2013, p. 31 ).

(3)   COM(2012) 528 .

(4)   COM(2015) 374 .

(5)   COM(2018) 594 .

(6)   COM(2018) 307 .

(7)  Regulation (EU) 2020/851 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 June 2020 amending Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 on Community statistics on migration and international protection ( OJ L 198, 22.6.2020, p. 1 ).

(8)  Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2021/431 of 10 March 2021 granting derogations to certain Member States from Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 of the European Parliament and of the Council on Community statistics on migration and international protection ( OJ L 86, 12.3.2021, p. 5 ).

(9) Belgium, Czechia, Germany, Spain, France, Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, Lithuania, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia and Sweden.

(10)  Regulation (EU) 2021/1147 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 July 2021 establishing the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund ( OJ L 251, 15.7.2021, p. 1 ).

(11)   http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/EN/migr_eil_esqrs.htm (English only); http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/en/migr_res_esms.htm (English only); https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/en/demo_pop_esms.htm (English only); https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/en/migr_immi_esms.htm (English only); https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/en/migr_acqn_esms.htm (English only).

(12)

 Regulation (EU) 2021/1148 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 7 July 2021 establishing, as part of the Integrated Border Management Fund, the Instrument for Financial Support for Border Management and Visa Policy ( OJ L 251, 15.7.2021, p. 48 ).

(13)   https://knowledge4policy.ec.europa.eu/organisation/kcmd-knowledge-centre-migration-demography_en .

(14)

  European Migration Network (EMN) , e.g.  https://ec.europa.eu/home-affairs/content/emn-annual-report-migration-and-asylum-2019_en  (English only).

(15)   https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/population-demography/overview   ( English, French and German). 

(16)   http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Population and https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Asylum_and_migration (English only).

(17)   https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-statistical-books/-/KS-EI-20-001   ( English, French and German). 

(18)   COM(2020) 241 and accompanying SWD(2021) 46 (English only).

(19)   http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php/Migration_and_migrant_population_statistics .

(20)   https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Asylum_statistics .

(21)  Regulation (EU) No 1260/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 November 2013 on European demographic statistics ( OJ L 330, 10.12.2013, p. 39 ).

(22)   https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/cache/metadata/en/migr_immi_esms.htm (English only).

(23)   http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/expert-group-on-refugee-statistics/home (English only).

(24)   https://unstats.un.org/unsd/statcom/49th-session/documents/BG-Item3m-RefugeeStat-E.pdf (English only).

(25)   https://unstats.un.org/unsd/statcom/51st-session/documents/BG-item-3n-international-recommendations-on-IDP-statistics-E.pdf (English only).

(26)   https://unstats.un.org/unsd/statcom/51st-session/documents/BG-item-3n-compilers-manual-E.pdf (English only).

(27)   https://unece.org/statistics/networks-of-experts/steering-group-migration-statistics  

(28)   https://unece.org/DAM/stats/publications/2018/ECECESSTAT20186.pdf  

(29)   https://unece.org/sites/default/files/2021-03/ECECESSTAT20206.pdf  

(30)   https://unstats.un.org/unsd/demographic-social/migration-expert-group/

(31)   COM(2020) 609 .

(32) Tentative new data needs include new characteristics of asylum applications (accelerated or border procedure, identity documents presented, care and access to education of unaccompanied minors), more frequent (quarterly) statistics on resettled persons, Dublin procedures and third-country nationals refused entry or found to be illegally present, disaggregation for certain indicators (i.e. refused entry, apprehensions and illegal border crossings disaggregated by unaccompanied minors; third-country nationals disembarked following search and rescue operations disaggregated by nationality, applicants for international protection and unaccompanied minors), as well as new characteristics of persons obliged to leave (type and duration of detention, if applicable) or returned (destination country, type of bilateral or EU level readmission agreement/arrangement used).

(33)  European Union Agency for the Operational Management of Large-Scale IT Systems in the Area of Freedom, Security and Justice (eu-LISA). Potentially relevant eu-LISA systems are the European system for the comparison of fingerprints of asylum applicants (Eurodac), the Schengen Information System (SIS), the Visa Information System (VIS), the European Travel Information and Authorisation System (ETIAS), and the Entry/Exit System (EES).

(34)  Article 39 of Regulation (EU) 2019/817 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2019 on establishing a framework for interoperability between EU information systems in the field of borders and visa ( OJ L 135, 22.5.2019, p. 27 );Article 39 of Regulation (EU) 2019/818 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2019 on establishing a framework for interoperability between EU information systems in the field of police and judicial cooperation, asylum and migration ( OJ L 135, 22.5.2019, p. 85 ).

(35)  Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 October 2018 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by the Union institutions, bodies, offices and agencies and on the free movement of such data ( OJ L 295, 21.11.2018, p. 39 ).

(36)  Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 March 2009 on European statistics ( OJ L 87, 31.3.2009, p. 164 ).

(37)   https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/12958-European-statistics-on-population-ESOP_en  

(38) The evaluation and impact assessment will address the needs for additional characteristics of population, e.g. various details of subnational or subregional location, equality, anti-discrimination, vulnerability and disability characteristics of specific population groups, including migrant populations.