Italy: Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes (ROSC)—Data Module
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This Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes (ROSC) data module provides an assessment of Italy’s macroeconomic statistics against the Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) complemented by an assessment of data quality based on the IMF’s Data Quality Assessment Framework. The report covers the national accounts, the consumer price index (CPI), the producer price index (PPI), and the government finance statistics (GFS). The report reveals that in comparison with the situation in 2002, Istat has the primary responsibility for the dissemination of general government statistics to the public.

Abstract

This Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes (ROSC) data module provides an assessment of Italy’s macroeconomic statistics against the Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS) complemented by an assessment of data quality based on the IMF’s Data Quality Assessment Framework. The report covers the national accounts, the consumer price index (CPI), the producer price index (PPI), and the government finance statistics (GFS). The report reveals that in comparison with the situation in 2002, Istat has the primary responsibility for the dissemination of general government statistics to the public.

I. Overall Assessment

1. Italy subscribed to the SDDS on August 13, 1996 and started posting its metadata on the Dissemination Standards Bulletin Board (DSBB) on September 19, 1996. Italy is in observance of the Special Data Dissemination Standard (SDDS), meeting the specifications for coverage, periodicity, timeliness, and the dissemination of advance release calendars. To meet its dissemination requirements under the standard, Italy uses two flexibility options, namely for the timeliness of data on central government operations and production indices. The Appendix provides an overview of Italy’s dissemination practices compared to the SDDS.

2. This Report on the Observance of Standards and Codes (ROSC) data module covers the national accounts, the consumer price index (CPI), the producer price index (PPI), and the government finance statistics (GFS). For these datasets, the report constitutes an update of the data module for Italy conducted in 2002 that, in addition, covered the monetary and the balance of payments statistics.

3. One of the main findings of this report, in comparison with the situation in 2002, is that Istat has the primary responsibility for the dissemination of general government statistics to the public. This is consistent with Istat having established and still chairing a formal interagency working group—made up of Istat, the Ministry of Finance (MEF), and the Bank of Italy (BI)—to enhance the consistency of the GFS produced by these agencies, and Istat transmitting the general government statistics to Eurostat. The responsibility for compiling and disseminating a comprehensive and integrated set of general government statistics remains to be specified. In doing so, it would be useful to preserve the valuable interagency data cross–checking, a trademark of the Italian GFS statistics, by maintaining each agency’s responsibilities for the separate components. A further noteworthy improvement since 2002 is the benchmark revision of the national accounts, which was successfully implemented in spite of continuing severe strains on staff resources. With regard to the CPI, innovative development work is well advanced on implementing random sampling techniques and the price collection period has been adjusted to fully reflect the reference month.

4. Section II provides a summary assessment by agency and dataset, based on a four–part scale. This is followed by staff recommendations in Section III. The Appendix summarizes Italy’s practices compared with the SDDS. The authorities’ response to this report and an annex with detailed assessments are presented in separate documents.

5. The remainder of this section presents the mission’s main conclusions using the IMF’s Data Quality Assessment Framework (DQAF), July 2003.

6. Prerequisites of quality: The Italian data–producing agencies rely on a legal and institutional framework that supports the quality of the datasets assessed in this report except for the GFS where the responsibility for compiling and disseminating a comprehensive and integrated set of general government statistics remains to be specified. Resources are broadly commensurate with the existing statistical programs of the data categories under review, with the exception of the National Accounts Directorate of Istat. The staff in the Directorate is well qualified and highly motivated but their number is insufficient to deal with the considerable expansion of work in both the GFS and the national accounts.

7. Assurance of integrity: All agencies demonstrate professionalism, are transparent in their practices, and provide guidelines on ethical conduct to their staff.

8. Methodological soundness: All four datasets reviewed follow internationally accepted guidelines in terms of concepts and definitions, classification and sectorization, and basis of valuation. However, the scope of the national CPI could be improved by including the services of owner–occupied dwellings as articulated in the Consumer Price Index Manual, and the GFS are yet to be presented in the integrated and comprehensive set of statements for general government of the Government Finance Statistics Manual 2001 (GFSM 2001).

9. Accuracy and reliability: The 2005 revision of the national accounts changed the benchmark year from 1992 to 2000, revised the calculation and allocation of financial services indirectly measured (FISIM), improved many compilation methods and introduced chained volume and price measures (work is still ongoing on a few series). However, the estimates are affected by certain weaknesses that remain regarding the data sources. Sound data sources and techniques are used to compile the CPI. The PPI has been rebased from 1995 to 2000 but there is scope to improve some of the statistical techniques and the weighting data sources. The consistency of various components of the GFS has been enhanced through better interagency coordination. The validation process at Istat is constrained by important time lags in assessing the economic nature of transactions and practices that limit revisions to the published aggregates. This may lead to inconsistencies with the GFS component that is under the responsibility of the BI.

10. Serviceability: The Italian datasets fully conform to the periodicity and timeliness requirements of the SDDS with the exception of the timeliness of data on monthly central government operations and the production indices, for which flexibility options are taken. In fact, Italy exceeds the SDDS requirements in key areas such as the CPI (which has a timeliness of 15 days versus the SDDS requirement of 30 days) and the GFS (quarterly estimates on both an accrual and cash bases versus a SDDS annual periodicity on a cash or accrual requirements). As well, in addition to the SDDS required quarterly central government debt data published by the MEF, the BI also publishes monthly government debt data. Data are consistent and revision policies are sound although practices could be improved in certain areas, such as identifying revised data and providing more details on GFS revisions.

11. Accessibility: All four datasets are readily available to the public and are accompanied by suitable, comprehensive documentation on concepts, scope, classification, basis of recording, data sources, and statistical techniques. Serviceability to users is adequate, including clear identification of contact persons in all Istat releases.

II. Assessment by Agency and Dataset

12. The assessment of the quality of four macroeconomic datasets—national accounts, CPI, PPI, and GFS—was conducted using the July 2003 version of the DQAF (a refinement of the 2001 version that was used for the 2002 data module ROSC). In this section, the results are presented at the level of the DQAF elements, making use of a four–point rating scale (Table 1). Tables 2a-b present the staff’s assessments regarding the Prerequisites of data quality and Assurances of integrity (dimensions “0” and “1” of the DQAF). Tables 3a-d show, for each dataset, the assessments of Methodological soundness, Accuracy and reliability, Serviceability, and Accessibility (dimensions “2” through “5” of the DQAF).

Table 1.

Italy: Data Quality Assessment Framework July 2003—Summary Results

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Practice observed: current practices generally in observance meet or achieve the objectives of DQAF internationally accepted statistical practices without any significant deficiencies. Practice largely observed: some departures, but these are not seen as sufficient to raise doubts about the authorities’ ability to observe the DQAF practices. Practice largely not observed: significant departures and the authorities will need to take significant action to achieve observance. Practice not observed: most DQAF practices are not met. Not applicable: used only exceptionally when statistical practices do not apply to a country’s circumstances.
Table 2a.

Italy: Assessment of Data Quality—Dimensions 0 and 1—Istat

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Table 2b.

Italy: Assessment of Data Quality—Dimensions 0 and 1—Istat, Ministry of Economy and Finance, and the Bank of Italy—Government Finance Statistics Components

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Table 3a.

Italy: Assessment of Data Quality—Dimensions 2 to 5—National Accounts

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Table 3b.

Italy: Assessment of Data Quality—Dimensions 2 to 5—Consumer Price Index

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Table 3c.

Italy: Assessment of Data Quality—Dimensions 2 to 5—Producer Price Index

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Table 3d.

Italy: Assessment of Data Quality—Dimensions 2 to 5—Government Finance Statistics

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III. Staff’s Recommendations

13. Based on the review of Italy’s statistical practices, discussions with the data–producing agencies, and consultation with data users, the mission made a set of recommendations. They are designed to increase further Italy’s adherence to internationally accepted statistical practices and would, in the mission’s view, enhance the analytical usefulness of Italy’s statistics. Some additional technical suggestions are included in the Detailed Assessments volume.

Cross–cutting Recommendations

  • Increase the number of permanent staff in Istat’s National Accounts Directorate in view of the expanded compilation program of the national accounts and GFS (short term).

  • Istat to flag the status of published data (provisional, revised) and supply the necessary information to assess revision changes (short term).

National Accounts

  • Implement existing plans to balance the supply–and–use tables simultaneously at current and constant prices (short term).

  • Strictly adhere to the scheduled calendar of the cost structure surveys, which are essential for the accuracy of the supply–and–use tables (medium term).

  • Develop short–term statistics on changes in inventories (short term).

  • Continue to investigate and implement ways to improve the response rates of Istat’s mandatory enterprise surveys (short term).

Consumer Price Index

  • Continue to contribute to the development of a measure of the services of owner-occupied dwellings and to the debate on the preferred approach for inclusion in national CPIs with a view to incorporating this very important activity within the scope of the Italian National CPI (short term).

Producer Price Index

  • Bring forward plans to introduce more sophisticated imputation and quality adjustment techniques within the PPI as soon as practicable (short term).

  • Continue to work on the improvement in the response rates for the PRODCOM and SBS surveys, including the initiative to augment missing respondent data with data from the Chamber of Commerce register, especially the sales data required for PPI weights (short term).

Government Finance Statistics

  • Establish the responsibility for compiling and disseminating a comprehensive and integrated set of general government statistics, preserving the valuable inter–agency cross–checking by maintaining each agency’s responsibilities for the separate components (short term).

  • Produce a comprehensive and integrated set of GFS using the GFSM 2001 framework, integrating GFS data produced by Istat, the MEF, and the BI. The initiative currently underway to convert ESA 95 data into the GFSM 2001 format provides a good basis in that direction (medium term).

  • Pursue the work on exploiting sources on the arrears and trade credits1 of local health units (short term).

  • In validating data, incorporate, in addition to methodological changes, new statistical information in the aggregate figures (short term).

  • Pursue the inter–agency cross–checking work to eliminate the discrepancy between the borrowing requirement and the SGP deficit (short term).

  • Provide more details on GFS revisions in tabular form (short term).

  • Improve the timeliness of the data on the monthly central government operations in accordance with the SDDS (medium term).

APPENDIX

Table 4.

Italy: Practices Compared to the SDDS Coverage, Periodicity, and Timeliness of Data

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Note:Periodicity and timeliness: (D) daily; (W) weekly or with a lag of no more than one week from the reference data or the closing of the reference week; (M) monthly or with a lag of no more than one month; (Q) quarterly or with a lag of no more than one quarter; (A) annually; NLT not longer than, and (…) not applicable.

Given that the data are broadly disseminated by private means, the timeliness with which official data are disseminated is not time critical.

Data are released simultaneously to all interested parties, generally on the websites of the relevant agencies and on Italy’s National Summary Data Page, which is maintained by Istat (http://www.Istat.it/fmi/ITALY–NSDP.html).
1

These categories of financial instruments are not part of the Maastricht debt definition

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