Business register for statistical purposes

Statistics Estonia

Data Acquisition and Processing Department

Svetlana Šutova

Team Lead

51 Tatari Str, 10134 Tallinn, Estonia

svetlana.shutova [at] stat.ee

37253003909

27/03/2025

27/03/2025

Identification, stratification and demographic data of economic units

Estonian Classification of Economic Activities (EMTAK 2008) based on NACE Rev. 2

Type of owner

Classification of legal forms

Classification of Estonian administrative units and settlements

International Standard Codes for the Representation of the Names of Countries (ISO 3166)

Classification of institutional sectors

Includes data on all economic units active in Estonia, except households and embassies of foreign countries

Calendar year profile — the frame of active economic units which were active during the calendar year. The calendar year profile is compiled in October of the next year, when most of the data on the reference year is available. It is used for production of annual economic statistics.

Economic unit — enterprise, non-profit association, foundation, government institution and local government institution. Enterprise consists of one or more companies (public limited company, private limited company, limited partnership, general partnership, commercial association) or branches of foreign companies or sole proprietors. Active units are units that showed signs of economic activity during the year (turnover, employees, investments, etc.). “Life signs” available from other data sources are also considered.

Statistical profile — the preliminary frame of economic units that were active during the year when the profile was compiled, including units that were active for only a part of the year. The preliminary frame is compiled in October and it is used for the production of annual statistics of the same year and short-term statistics of the following year.

Type of owner — a basis for the classification of owners is capital involvement (majority of votes) in the company.

Legal unit;

enterprise;

local unit;

local kind-of-activity unit;

kind-of-activity unit;

enterprise group

Economic units that are part of the national accounts and regional accounts system – enterprises and non-profit institutions

FRAME

List of economic units, i.e. enterprises and non-profit institutions, that are part of the national accounts and regional accounts system

Estonia as a whole

1995–…

Not applicable

Statistical units – number;

employed persons – number and size group;

employees – number and size group

Year

DIRECTLY APPLICABLE LEGAL ACTS

Regulation (EC) No 2019/2152 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 November 2019 on European business statistics, repealing 10 legal acts in the field of business statistics (Text with EEA relevance)

Council Regulation (EEC) No 696/93 of 15 March 1993 on the statistical units for the observation and analysis of the production system in the Community

Regulation (EC) No 1893/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 December 2006 establishing the statistical classification of economic activities NACE Revision 2 and amending Council Regulation (EEC) No 3037/90 as well as certain EC Regulations on specific statistical domains

OTHER LEGAL ACTS

Not available

OTHER AGREEMENTS

Not available

The dissemination of data collected for the production of official statistics is based on the requirements laid down in §§ 32, 34, 35 and 38 of the Official Statistics Act.

The dissemination of data collected for the production of official statistics is based on the requirements laid down in §§ 34 and 35 of the Official Statistics Act.

The principles for treatment of confidential data can be found here.

Notifications about the dissemination of statistics are published in the release calendar, which is available on the website. Every year on 1 October, the release times of the statistical database, news releases, main indicators by IMF SDDS and publications for the following year are announced in the release calendar (in the case of publications – the release month).

Calendar

All users have been granted equal access to official statistics: dissemination dates of official statistics are announced in advance and no user category (incl. Eurostat, state authorities and mass media) is provided access to official statistics before other users. Official statistics are first published in the statistical database. If there is also a news release, it is published simultaneously with data in the statistical database. Official statistics are available on the website at 8.00 a.m. on the date announced in the release calendar.

Year

Not published

Not published

The data are published in the statistical database at https://andmed.stat.ee/en/stat in all tables of the subject areas Enterprises, Non-profit institutions and General data.

The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 33, § 34, § 35, § 36, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act. Access to microdata and anonymisation of microdata are regulated by Statistics Estonia’s procedure for dissemination of confidential data for scientific purposes.

The purpose of the statistical activity is to create and maintain the population of economic units in the system of national and regional accounts, which is used as a frame for statistical activities (based on the data of economic units).

Data serve as input for statistical activities 20903 "Business demography", 20904 "Enterprise groups" and 21209 "Statistical register of agricultural holdings".

Council Regulation (EEC) No 696/93 of 15 March 1993 on the statistical units for the observation and analysis of the production system in the Community

Business Registers Recommendations Manual, Eurostat

International Guidelines on Statistical Business Registers, UNECE

Not available

To assure the quality of processes and products, Statistics Estonia applies the EFQM Excellence Model, the European Statistics Code of Practice and the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (ESS QAF). Statistics Estonia is also guided by the requirements in § 7, “Principles and quality criteria of producing official statistics” of the Official Statistics Act.

Statistics Estonia performs all statistical activities according to an international model (Generic Statistical Business Process Model – GSBPM). According to the GSBPM, the final phase of statistical activities is overall evaluation using information gathered in each phase or sub-process; this information can take many forms, including feedback from users, process metadata, system metrics and suggestions from employees. This information is used to prepare an evaluation report, which outlines all the quality problems related to the specific statistical activity and serves as input for improvement actions.

Ministry of Finance;

state and local government institutions;

non-profit organisations;

research and educational institutions;

enterprises;

central bank of Estonia (Eesti Pank).

Since 1996, Statistics Estonia has conducted reputation and user satisfaction surveys. All results are available on the website of Statistics Estonia in the section User surveys.

In compliance with the rules (regulations)

Used source data and thorough checking of the data ensure sufficient accuracy.

Not applicable

Not measured

The statistical profile data are published 17 days after the end of the reference year (T + 17 days).

The data have been published at the time announced in the release calendar.

The data are comparable with the data of other European Union countries because a common methodology for business registers for statistical purposes has been used.

The data are comparable over time.

Statistical activities 20901 "Business register for statistical purposes", 20903 "Business demography" and 20300 "Financial statistics of enterprises (annual)" use the population of economically active enterprises, but the data of the three statistical activities differ slightly as the data are compiled at different points in time and the data composition is not the same. The statistics on business demography and the financial statistics of enterprises refer to enterprises that have been active during the year, while the data from the business register for statistical purposes additionally include enterprises registered during the year that do not yet show signs of economic activity. Business demography statistics do not cover holding companies (EMTAK K642) and enterprises engaged in agriculture, forestry and fishing (EMTAK A).

The annual financial statistics of enterprises do not cover enterprises engaged in financial and insurance activities (EMTAK K), sole proprietors and branches of foreign companies with less than 20 employees. All these units are included in the business register for statistical purposes.

The data are made internally coherent by using a common methodology in data management. The outputs of the statistical activity are coherent.

The data revision policy and notification of corrections are described in the section Principles of dissemination of official statistics on the website of Statistics Estonia.

Not applicable

SURVEY DATA

Not used

ADMINISTRATIVE DATA

The following data are received from the Centre of Registers and Information Systems: data on registered companies, branches of foreign companies, sole proprietors, shareholders of companies, non-profit associations and foundations, government institutions and local government institutions and on their subdivisions and structural units.

Data of the register of taxable persons are received from the Estonian Tax and Customs Board.

Data on subsidiaries of Estonian companies located outside the European Union (EU) and in other EU countries are received from Eesti Pank (the central bank of Estonia).

Data on units providing accommodation are received from Enterprise Estonia (EAS).

DATA FROM OTHER STATISTICAL ACTIVITIES

Data from statistical activities 20007 "Financial statistics of enterprises (quarterly)", 20300 "Financial statistics of enterprises (annual)", 22303 "Foreign trade", 40407 "Museum", 21101 "Wages and salaries", 21302 "Financial statistics of insurance enterprises (monthly)", 22101 "Accommodation", 22109 "Accommodation establishments", 22203 "Manufactured goods and industrial services" are used.

Continuously

For the statistical activity “Business register for statistical purposes” data are not collected separately. The data from administrative registers and source data from other statistical activities are used as input.

Data from the Estonian Tax and Customs Board are received via X-Road and FTP-server.

Data from the Centre of Registers and Information Systems are received via X-Road.

Arithmetic and qualitative controls are used in the validation process, including comparison with the data of previous periods, other surveys and administrative data sources. Before data dissemination, internal coherence of the data is checked.

The business register for statistical purposes is updated regularly on the basis of legal registers and other data sources: central bank of Estonia (Eesti Pank), statistical questionnaires, information received from companies by letter or telephone, public databases, the media.

Not applicable

Not available