1. Central Business Register Central Statistics Office
Presented By
Deepuk Bahadoor
Central Statistics Office
MAURITIUS
1/1/2019

2. Central Business Register
ULTIMATE AIM
To have a live Central Business Register containing primary data on all businesses in the Republic of Mauritius.
1/1/2019

3. Central Business Register
CBR Unit was setup for the first time to compile a Business Register
Why? Sampling Frame for the 1997 Census of Economic Activities
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4. Main Data Source
Licenses issued by the 5 Municipalities and 4 District Councils (Local Authorities) of Mauritius
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5. Data Quality (a) Units: Licenses issued instead of establishments
Classifications: Trade codes being used
Coverage: Not all activities are covered
Demography: Outdated Information (Operational, Closed, Dormant etc.)
Periodicity: Annual
Timeliness: 5-6 months after reference period
1/1/2019

6. Improving the Business Register
Classifications
Trade Codes and description of activities at local authorities
NSIC coded at CSO (around 80,000 licenses!)
Training of staff of Local Authorities for codification of activities by NSIC
1/1/2019

7. Improving the Business Register
Coverage
Tapping other sources
(a) National Transport Authority (Public transport)
(b) Ministry of Education (Private schools)
(c )Judicial Department (Legal activities)
(d) Professional Councils (Medical Practitioners, Dentists, Architects, etc.)
(e) Customs Department (Freeport companies)
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8. Improving the Business Register
Coverage (Cont’d)
(f) Financial Services Commission (Offshore Companies)
(g) The Police Department (Driving schools)
(h) Tourism Authority (Tourism activities)
Beach Authority (Activities on the beaches)
(j) Government and parastatal bodies
(k) Agricultural Units from Ministry of Agriculture
(L) Non-Profit Institutions
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9. Improving the Business Register
Demography (New, operational, Dormant and Closed businesses)
List of New businesses and closed ones provided by Local Authorities for the year
Quality of information
10-20% - Changed activities / dormant / closed (1997 Census of Economic Activities)
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10. Improving the Business Register
Periodicity and Timeliness (Data submission by local authorities)
Annual up to 2007 (Within 6 months after reference period)
Bi-annual – 2007 to 2009 (Within 2 months after reference period)
Quarterly – 2010 (Within 6 weeks after reference period)
1/1/2019

11. Sampling Frame of Establishments
Licenses v/s Establishments
Construction of sampling frame of establishments for the Census of Economic Activities – Consolidation of Licenses to establishment – (4 months work!!)
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12. Use of the Business register
Sampling Frame
List of establishments to researchers
Annual Publications (Economic and Social Indicators and Digest of Business Activities)
Indicators - Evolution of licenses/Registrations by District, Activity - NSIC (2 or more digit level)
Estimates of Gross output and Value added for certain activities for National Accounts purposes
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13. Way forward The Business Registration Act of 2006
- New data source – Companies Division
- Strength: Upto Date, unit of business is establishment, standardised, Centralised data source, accessibility, Business Registration Number, Periodicity and Timeliness
- Weakness: Trade codes v/s ISIC
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14. Way forward
Implementation of e-Business Plan and the centralised database
- New Application Architecture based on PostgreSQL
- will be ready in around 2 month time
- It includes possibility of automatic transfer of raw data from supplier to the CSO centralised database
- Data can be listed by Establishment and Enterprise
- increase from some 20 to 64 fields (including No. of persons engaged)
- Automated validation, coding and reporting with possibility of querying the database
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15. Thank You
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