National Statistics Office

Directorate B: Business Statistics

Short-term Business Statistics Unit

National Statistics Office

Lascaris Valletta, VLT 2000, Malta

The Industrial Producer Price Index (IPPI) is an output price index and measures the change in the prices of goods sold by producers in the industrial sector on a monthly basis.

The index is split into domestic producer prices and non-domestic producer prices.

The classifications used in STS is NACE rev.2.

The following NACE divisions are covered:

• 0800 - Quarrying
• 1000 - Manufacture of food products
• 1100 - Manufacture of beverages
• 1300 - Manufacture of textiles
• 1400 - Manufacture of wearing apparel
• 1600 - Manufacture of wood and of wood products
• 1700 - Manufacture of paper and paper products
• 1800 - Printing and reproduction of recorded media
• 2000 - Manufacture of chemical and chemical products
• 2100 - Manufacture of basic pharmaceutical products and preparations
• 2200 - Manufacture of rubber and plastic products
• 2300 - Manufacture of other non-metallic products
• 2500 - Manufacture of fabricated metal products, except machinery and equipment
• 2600 - Manufacture of computer, electronic and optical products
• 2700 - Manufacture of electrical equipment
• 2800 - Manufacture of machinery and equipment 
• 2900 - Manufacture of motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers.
• 3100 - Manufacture of furniture
• 3200 - Other manufacturing
• 3300 - Repair and installation of machinery and equipment
• 3500 - Electricity and gas
• 3600 - Water collection, treatment and supply

The producer prices collected for this index are exclusive of VAT and reflect the price situation on the 15th day of every month.

Kind of Activity Unit (KAU).

The statistical population includes units falling under NACE Divisions 8 - 36. The population is maintained by the Business Registers unit. 

The indicator covers the national territory of the Maltese Islands.

The data on the Index of Industrial Producer Prices are available from the year 2000.

Base year (year on which weights are based): 2015

Reference year (year when the index equals 100): 2015

The same base and reference years are used for data published locally and that transmitted to Eurostat.

The data are provided in index form.

The data are collected and published on a monthly basis.

The NSO was established by virtue of the Malta Statistics Authority Act XXIV of 2000 and replaced the Central Office of Statistics as from 1 March 2001: https://legislation.mt/eli/cap/422/eng/pdf

On a European level, the related legislation is the European Business Statistics Regulations 2019/2152 and 2020/1997.

Data Sharing matters are governed by the Malta Statistics Authority Act XXIV of 2000. Industrial producer price data also falls under the SDDS and Eurostat requirements.

Apart from the established legislative framework, the NSO is also guided by an internal general confidentiality policy. Data tagged as confidential are not available for publication.

Confidentiality matters are regulated by the Malta Statistics Authority Act XXIV of 2000. Such data are marked as such.

An advance release calendar is published on the NSOs website.

All releases are published and disseminated at 1100 hrs as scheduled in the Advance Release Calendar. The calendar is published on the NSO website and includes a 3 month advance notice (the current month and the next two months).

https://nso.gov.mt/calendars/

National statistical releases are issued according to the release calendar and are made available to all users simultaneously. All releases are posted on the organisation's website, www.nso.gov.mt.

Eurostat transmissions for this index are carried out on a monthly basis and one month after the end of the reference period. National news releases for the index are also carried out on a monthly basis and according to the national news release calendar.

The main dissemination channel for official statistics is the NSO website (http://www.nso.gov.mt).

A monthly local news release is published for this indicator. The data are presented at MIG (Main Industrial Grouping) level.

The short-term statistics only publishes its figures in an annual compendium named Malta in Figures or Trends in Malta. These can be accessed from the NSO website: http://www.nso.gov.mt

The NSO website offers an online statistical database (StatDB) that provides a more in-depth analysis for the more expert statistical user or researcher. The StatDB requires registration as only registered users can extract data from the database. Registration is free-of-charge. Currently, this format is not available for this indicator.

In general, index results made available to Eurostat ensure a sufficient degree of representativeness of data. More detailed data than that published locally and internationally are available on request but are subject to the confidentiality clauses.

In such cases, data are provided in index form. Micro data are not provided to users.

Data are transmitted to Eurostat on a monthly basis and are part of the SDDS system.

The main documents used for the production of this index are the following:

European Business Statistics Manual, 2021

https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/en/web/products-manuals-and-guidelines/-/ks-gq-21-001

Producer Price Index manual, 2004

https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=16966

Not available.

The NSO quality assurance principles are developed according to the ESS Handbook for Quality Reports (2014). 

Aspects of quality are divided into several steps. These are specifying needs, designing and building data instruments and collecting, processing, analysing, disseminating, archiving and evaluating data. The main guiding principles in quality management are found in the:

European Statistics Code of Practice - https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/quality/european-quality-standards/european-statistics-code-of-practice

Quality Assurance Framework of the ESS - http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/64157/4392716/ESS-QAF-V1-2final.pdf/bbf5970c-1adf-46c8-afc3-58ce177a0646

Overall, the quality of the Industrial Producer Price Index is of good quality and very reliable.

The main users of the Industrial Producer Price Index are the following:

• Eurostat;
• Central Bank of Malta;
• Ministry of Finance, Malta;
• Other International Organisations.

Not available.

Data are compliant with relevant European and local regulations and requirements are fully fulfilled.

The overall accuracy of the indicator is considered to be of good quality. 

Sampling error is negligible, non-sampling error is small and the first estimates are not biased.

The sampling error is considered to be low, since the sample is a cut-off one and covers over 80% of the industry's turnover.

Due to the cutoff technique, an element of sampling bias is present, however this is not currently calculated.

Non-sampling errors relate to problems such as under or over coverage, non-response, data-processing and estimation. 

Non-sampling errors in the industrial producer price index are mainly due to non-response error. However, revisions in the producer price index are negligible and hence, errors are also negligible. Information on data collection errors is not avaiable, however this is considered to be small.

Turnover-weighted response rate is over 70%.

The Industrial Producer Price Index is disseminated one month after the reference period.

The NSO is committed to adhere to the timelines established by the STS Regulations and also issues news releases according to its pre-published calendar.

All deadlines were respected during the course of the year.

To ensure geographical comparability across member states the index is compiled according to the STS Regulations and STS Methodological Guidelines. The same concepts are applied to the whole national territory of the Maltese Islands.

The data series has been compiled since the year 2000. The first set of indicators was based on NACE Rev 1. Following 2009, the indicator was published according to the new NACE Rev 2 classification. Furthermore, for every year ending in 0 or 5, new fixed aggregation weights are introduced.

There is no break in series in the industrial producer price index.

Data are not compared with any other source.

Aggregates are consistent with the other components.

Data burden is considered high but no data are available.

Revisions are carried according to the European Business Statistics Regulation. Internal procedures are also established.

The same revision policy is applied to both data released nationally and that sent to Eurostat.

Revision analysis is carried out before every neews release published locally or sent to Eurostat and clear explanations are also sought. Detailed explanations at micro data level are also analysed  but only used internally for quality information purposes. Generally, this index will have routine minor revisions due to actual data replacing estimates due to non-response. Major revisions may also be done but this will be on an exceptional basis.

A revision calendar does not exist.

In practice, routine revisions are done when actual data are received and estimates are replaced.

The below Quality Performance Indicators (QPIs) were obtained using annual growth rates for December 2018 as the latest release. To calculate the revisions, the previous 36 monthly periods were used. On average, these are very similiar for each year.

Unadjusted annual growth rates:

• Mean Revision (MR): -0.05
• Mean Absolute Revision (MAR): 0.12
• Relative Mean Absolute Revision (RMAR): 0.13

Data are collected by means of a monthly survey sample of around 80 units. Each unit has one or more products that are monitored every 15th day of the month.

Monthly.

Data is collected by means of  a monthly statistical questionnaire sent automatically by the system. Questionnaires are sent and received by e-mail.

Validations of format and file structure checks and intra-dataset checks are checked with the use of in-house excel sheets and access databases.

Revisions analysis is also carried out for every data transmission sent to Eurostat using in-house access queries. When data revisions are significantly large, a short explanation is also given to Eurostat.

Non-response is treated by micro-estimation to ensure a full response for all surveyed units. The previous period is copied when it comes to industrial producer prices.

A Laspeyres type index is used for compilation and the weights are updated every 5 years from the Structural Business Statistics survey.

Data is produced in .csv format and converted to .xml format using the SDMX Converter 5.4.4.

No adjustments are done.

None.