Development of Export Import Price Indices Bhutan Development of Export Import Price Indices Fourth Project Support Meeting Bangkok, Thailand | 13 November 2017

Outline of Presentation What is the motivation of the project? What are you trying to achieve? What issues have you faced? And how do you intend to overcome them? What is your plan to progress the project (including timelines)? What have you learnt from the project so far? How does this affect RPES? (See slide notes below) How does this affect RPES? This slide varies depending on the nature of the presentation. For countries that are presenting on the projects not part of the RPES (Bangladesh, Lao PDR, Nepal and Timor Leste) the slide presents an opportunity to identify how the RPES could support the current project or how the project could be used to help other project country members – a case study for regional dissemination for example. For countries presenting on an RPES project (Bhutan, Cambodia, Maldives, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Viet Nam) the focus is on “how do the lessons affect future project implementation”. This can be for your country perspective or recommendations for the RPES project and other countries considering similar projects.

Motivation / Achieve To improve the economic statistics in supporting better policy decisions Foreign trade price indices are important indicators for analyzing growth and inflation Development of XMPI was also identified as priority by UN-ESCAP during its assessment in 2011.

Issues / Overcome Cut off Date for compilation? Use of formula for computation between Young upper level index vs. Fisher’s formula? Setting up of excel system for the new indices concomitantly with the development of the indices Lack of adequate manpower.

Plan to Progress / Timelines Sl/No. Activities Agency Responsible 2017 2018 Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul 1 Prepare a timeline for the development and implementation phases of the project. Price Statistics Section, NSB   2 Obtain quarterly electricity imports and exports data from DGPC, broken down by plant, back to 2014 Q1 (subject to decision 1 above). 3 Transfer annual trade in goods data (from 2005 to 2013) from PDF files published by DRC to Excel format and check the accuracy of the transfer (subject to decision 2 above). Price Statistics Section, NSB/Consultant 4 Evaluate price data sources for goods (including trade in goods data compiled by DRC, trade in electricity statistics compiled by DGPC, export prices currently collected by NSB for the PPI and components of the Bhutan CPI) and select the goods price baskets for imports and exports. 5 Recruit any new goods respondents and/or goods prices and, where possible, obtain historical prices back to 2014 Q1 (subject to decision 1 above) or 2005 (subject to decision 2 above). 6 Identify what price data and data sources would be required to develop and compile services import and export price indices of fit-for-purpose quality, and assess whether that could be achieved cost-effectively. National Accounts/ Price Section/ Consultant/Royal Monetary Authority 7 Select the services price baskets for imports and exports (subject to a decision to proceed with the services indices). 8 Recruit any new services respondents and/or services prices and, where possible, obtain historical prices back to 2014 Q1 (subject to decision 1 above) or 2005 (subject to decision 2 above). 9 Extract historical trade in services weighting data from the national accounts, broken down by type of service. National Accounts Section, NSB 10 Develop the Excel system to compile the import and export price indices. 11 Calculate historical weights and compile historical time series in the Excel system (subject to decisions 1 and 2 above). 12 Assess the benefits and costs of reweighting annually, every second year, or every third year. 13 Prepare documentation for the new indices and Excel compilation and reweighting system. 14 Provide training to the NSB Price team. 15 Prepare the first statistical release for the new indices.

Lessons learnt Strengthen the institutional links with stakeholders.

Impact on RPES It will help improve the economic statistics for Bhutan which should help in better decision making.

Q&A