UPDATE OF SNA 1993 Conference on National Accounts in the context of development cooperation Luxembourg 6-8 May 2008

MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PROJECT (1) In 2003, the United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) called for an update of the SNA 1993 The overall aim is to bring national accounts in line with the new economic environment, advances in methodological research and needs of users Feasibility of implementation and consistency with related manuals are key aspects

MAIN CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PROJECT (2) 44 issues have been identified by the ISWGNA with the help of the AEG A global consultation of NSIs and Central Banks on the full list of recommendations and on draft chapters has been organised In 2007, the UNSC approved the full list of recommendations

TWO VOLUMES Volume 1 (chapters 1 to 17 constituting the SNA framework) was approved by UNSC in February 2008, but with the possibility for countries to provide substantial comments until end of April Volume 2 (chapters 18 to 29 on government and rest of the world accounts and on extensions of accounts) to be submitted to the UNSC in March 2009

STRATEGY FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF THE SNA UNSC asked ISWGNA to develop a strategy for implementing the updated SNA  Eurostat/UNSD Conference on 6-8 May 2008 in Luxembourg

UNFUNDED GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEE PENSION SCHEMES Agreement on a compromise solution (Eurostat / ECB Task Force): The entitlements of unfunded government employee pension schemes can be either recorded in the core accounts or in a new standard (supplementary) table; rationale and criteria used in the above choice have to be provided by each country The new standard (supplementary) table will give a complete view of households’ pension entitlements Task Force work is being continued

RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT According to the recommendation : R&D should be treated as capital formation The value should be determined in terms of economic benefits it provides By convention, R&D may be valued at the sum of costs However, statistical difficulties remain to be solved before the long term objective of capitalizing R-D can be achieved OECD Task Force  Handbook Eurostat TasK Force  Supplementary tables

CAPITALISATION OF DESTRUCTIVE WEAPONS The AEG recommendation is to treat as capital formation all expenditure by the military corresponding to a use of one year or more  Ways to obtain the required data must be found

GOODS FOR PROCESSING The AEG recommendation is that the recording of imports and exports should be based on the change of ownership and no more on the physical movement Input-output tables will reflect what each unit contributes to the production process rather than the physical technology The physical movements of goods, captured in merchandise trade statistics, have to be reconciled with the international flows to be recorded in BoP and NA  UNECE/OECD/Eurostat Working Group on the Impact of globalization on national accounts  Guidelines

STATE OF PLAY ON VOLUME 1 Deadline for comments was 30 April. The ISWGNA will meet on Friday 9 May to consider all the comments The aim is to finalise the text of Volume 1 by end May, for a release in summer The volume will be available in pre-edit version on the project website. A hardcopy will follow The ISWGNA will look into translation arrangements

OUTLINE TIMETABLE FOR VOLUME 2 Until mid-July, chapters posted for world-wide comments Until mid-September, comments on last draft chapters From September onwards, redraft of Volume 2 for it to be ready around mid-December for consideration prior to UNSC in February 2009