Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO)

Section Environment, Sustainable Development, Territory

Data presents environmental tax revenue (by tax category - energy, transport, pollution and resource taxes) broken down by economic activity (tax payer), using the NACE classification for production activities extended to cover taxes payable by households and non-residents.

Environmental tax revenue is broken down by:
A. type of environmental tax,
B. sector/industry of tax payer

A. Classification according to type of environmental tax

For analytical purposes, the environmental taxes are divided into four categories:
1. energy taxes (including CO₂ taxes),
2. transport taxes,
3. pollution taxes,
4. resource taxes (excluding taxes on oil and gas extraction).

B. Environmental taxes by economic activity

Environmental tax revenues are allocated to the different tax payers:
• by economic activity according to the statistical classification of economic activities in the European Community (NACE Rev.2)
• households as consumers
• non-residents
• not allocated (impossible to be allocated to one of the categories mentioned above)

Environmental taxes by economic activity data cover taxes payable by all sectors of the economy: producers (economic activities by NACE), households as consumers as well as non-residents. 

 The environmental tax statistics are compiled based on Eurostat’s 2013 'Environmental taxes - a statistical guide'. Environmental tax is defined as "A tax whose tax base is a physical unit (or a proxy of a physical unit) of something that has a proven, specific negative impact on the environment, and which is identified in ESA2010 as a tax".

Environmental tax statistics are part of European environmental economic accounts, which constitute satellite accounts to national accounts. Thus, environmental tax statistics follows ESA2010 definition of ‘taxes’. Consequently, only payments that are identified as taxes in the national accounts can be reported as environmental taxes whereas other types of payments to government are not excluded from the scope of the data collection. Compliance with the tax definition of the national accounts improves international comparability of the statistics, and is in line with the guidance, concepts and definitions of the System of environmental and economic accounting (SEEA).

Data refer to environmental taxes collected by the government and payable by the different economic agents.

The target population are all production sectors by NACE, households as consumers and non-residents.

Switzerland

The data transmitted to Eurostat cover the time series 1995-2021. Detailed data by economic activity (NACE Rev.2) are available for the years 2008-2021, while more aggregated data exist since 1995.

In addition, estimates for the year 2022 and aggregated data for the years 1990-1994 are available and published at the national level.

Not applicable.

Million National Currency (MNAC)

The data refer to the calendar years.

Statistics on environmental taxes are based on Regulation (EC) No. 691/2011 (Annex II) on European environmental economic accounts as amended by Regulation 538/2014, as well as legal acts in the area of national accounts. Data transmission became obligatory in September 2013. Before, Eurostat collected the data on a voluntary basis.

The basis for the national accounts tax aggregates is Table 9 "Detailed tax and social contribution receipts by type of tax or social contribution and receiving sub-sector including the list of taxes and social contributions according to national classification" of the ESA2010 transmission programme - Annex B of Regulation (EU) No. 549/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 21 May 2013 on the European system of national and regional accounts in the European Union. Moreover, Commission Regulation (EC) N° 995/2001 of 22 May 2001 implementing Council and European Parliament Regulation (EC) N° 2516/2000 of 10 July 2000 on the recording of taxes and social contributions sets the rules for the data sources, time of recording and comparable treatment of taxes and social contributions assessed but unlikely to be collected.

From 2020 onwards, Switzerland delivers data to Eurostat based on the regulation that is now part of the Annex A of the bilateral statistical agreement between Switzerland and the European Union. Before that, Switzerland delivered data to Eurostat on a voluntary basis.

Not applicable.

The statistical production is mainly framed by the Federal Statistics Act (FStatA) of 9 October 1992 (Status as of 1 January 2016) and the Federal Act on Data Protection (FADP) of 19 June 1992 (Status as of 1 March 2019) in Switzerland. The latter aims to ensure data protection within federal statistical bodies and that published data are aggregated in a way that the persons or enterprises concerned are not recognisable.

Confidential data are used in the production process for the allocation of some environmental taxes by economic activity. The published results are aggregated values (combination of several taxes by tax category) which prevent the identification of any individual or enterprise. Some NACE positions are only published at the NACE section level or grouped with other NACE positions. This is due to either privacy protection reasons (as for C19 for example), difficulties in accurately separating some NACE divisions, or consistency issues with the National Accounts (NA).

Environmental taxes by economic activity (ETEA) data are published annually at the national level by the end of April.

A national dissemination calendar is available in the section “agenda” of the website of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO). The date of dissemination is generally communicated a few weeks before publication.

The data are publicly disseminated on the webpage “Environmental taxes” of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO) in an objective, professional and transparent manner in which all users are treated equitably. The users who are interested in these data may subscribe a news mail (available in French, German and Italian) for being informed about the dissemination of data and other publications in the area “Territory and environment”.

Some unpublished data are sometimes delivered to users with specific needs. 

See concept 8.1

There is usually no specific press release for the annual dissemination of data on environmental taxes.

Environmental tax statistics are mainly published in form of indicators on the webpage dedicated to “Environmental taxes” of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO). For each indicator, a graphical representation is available with the possibility to download the corresponding data.

Some environmental tax data are included in indicator systems relating to the environment, climate change or wellbeing (available in French and German), and in the MONET 2030 indicator system (available in French, German, Italian and English) which gives an overview of sustainable development in Switzerland. These four indicator systems are published by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO).

Finally, some general results of the environmental taxes accounts are presented in the publication “Air emissions and environmentally related taxes by economic player” (2014), while a more specific analysis dedicated to the fossil energy agents is presented in the publication “Tax revenue from fossil energy agents” (2016). More recently, some results of the environmental taxes accounts have been published in the publication “Households and climate from the perspective of environmental accounts” (2022), that offers original insights on the links between households and climate based on the environmental accounts.

Interactive detailed data on environmental taxes by tax category and economic activity are available on the following webpage of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO). Moreover, two summary tables are available on the webpage dedicated to “Environmental taxes” (see section “Tables” in the box named “Further information”). They present environmental taxes data by economic player and by economic activity (aggregated by sections) for the different tax categories and for the longest time series available.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Data on environmental taxes are available on the website of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO) in form of indicators, summary tables and interactive tables as well as analysed in punctual studies.

The webpages are available in German, French, Italian and English. However, please note that our English and Italian pages offer a limited range of information on our statistical production. For our full range, please consult our pages in French and German.

Not applicable.

Environmental taxes data are computed based on the Eurostat’s manual “Environmental taxes - A statistical guide - 2013 edition”. A very short description of the methodology is available on the webpage of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO) dedicated to “Environmental taxes” (see section “Methodologies” in the box named “Further information”). It gives some basic specifications related to the considered definitions, the categories of taxes and the main principles to ensure national and international comparability. For the interested users, it also includes a link to Eurostat’s manual.

A technical report exists at the national level and is restricted to an internal use. It gives information on the production process of the environmental taxes data in Switzerland (e.g. description of the production process, presentation of the main production steps, directory structure, organization and use of the files and databases).

Not applicable.

Not available.

Automatic quality checks and controls are implemented as much as possible in the production process, in order to detect potential problems as early as possible. At the end, the outputs of the ETEA data compilation process are systematically compared with the results of the last data transmission. Detailed controls at the level of taxes and economic activities are implemented. If relatively important changes are observed from one year to the next, an explanation has to be found in order to validate the result. It implies to analyse in detail the variations in the data sources and to check the entire production process if necessary.

The data production is in a constant improvement process. The procedures are improved from one year to the next, by adding automatic controls and plausibility checks. Moreover, data providers are systematically asked to provide corrected data if there are any changes or revisions in the data that they have previously delivered.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Some NACE positions are only published at the NACE section level or grouped with other NACE positions. This is due to either privacy protection reasons (as for C19 for example), difficulties in accurately separating some NACE divisions or consistency issues with the National Accounts (NA). Moreover, some data for the non-mandatory years are also provided to Eurostat.

Not applicable.

This statistic is based on the best available data. However, there are some known deficiencies and the applied methodology is in a permanent process of improvement. The accuracy of the results depends on the data sources used for the allocation of taxes’ revenues to the entities paying the taxes as well as on the relative importance of the tax revenues considered. For example, accuracy is limited in the cases where the allocation of the tax revenue is based on data which correlate only to a certain degree with the tax base.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

See concept 14.1.2.

See concept 14.1.2.

There are 16 months from the last day of the reference period to the day of publication of results allocated by economic activity (T+16 months).  As some source data are not available at T+16 months, the results of the breakdown by NACE activities for the year 2021 are considered provisional. Moreover, some estimates are available and published at the national level at T+4 months.

Switzerland publishes the data at the national level by the end of April and transmits the data to Eurostat as timely as possible.

Not applicable.

All the considered taxes have a tax base that is mentioned in the statistical guide on environmental taxes. Moreover, there are no taxes described in the handbook that are not covered or deliberately excluded from the transmitted data.

Not applicable.

There are no changes in the statistical process over time. Thus, by using a common framework, data are comparable over time. 

There are no breaks in time series.

There are no breaks in time series.

The National Accounts (NA) are the main data source for the total revenue of each environmental tax. For few taxes collected at cantonal level (some cantonal taxes for electricity, on waste and wastewater), and of relative small importance (less than 1% of the total environmental taxes), the data are provided directly by local/cantonal government administrations.

The Swiss Federal Finance Administration delivers a National Tax List (NTL) to Eurostat. The data used in the environmental accounts either derive directly from the NA or are provided by another source and are compared with the NA and/or the NTL for coherence.

In order to ensure that new taxes (or changes in existing taxes) are adequately captured in our accounts, we constantly monitor the public information (e.g. we are registered to an official news-mail informing about the environment, about taxes and related topics). All information about the introduction (or the possible/probable introduction) of a new environmental tax is registered in a file devoted to depicting such kind of information.

Not applicable.

See concept 15.3.

ETEA data are globally coherent with the National Tax List (NTL), with the exception of few differences. On the one hand, some taxes are not classified in the same way. More precisely, the NTL classifies some revenues as pollution taxes, while they are classified as transport or energy taxes in ETEA. These discrepancies are currently discussed in order to define to what extent it is possible to improve consistency between the NTL and ETEA. On the other hand, some cantonal taxes (i.e. on waste and wastewater) are considered in ETEA, while they are not reported in the NTL. However, the proportions of such taxes are relatively small (less than 1% of the total taxes).

The data reported are internally coherent (totals are equal to the sum of the breakdowns). However confidential data as well as rounding issues could result in some gaps between totals and the sum of its (published) components.

About 0.4 full-time equivalents of work are required to compile the ETEA data in Switzerland, to publish the results at the national level (in the form of indicators, summary tables and interactive tables as well as analysed in thematic studies) on the website of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO) and to transmit the data and the quality report to Eurostat.

Three types of revisions are defined: routine revisions, methodological revisions and non-scheduled revisions.

Routine revisions are carried out every year:

• Each year, figures of the last years are revised if basic data sources were also revised (changes from provisional to definitive status).

• Each year, revisions in the main data sources used for the allocation by economic activity are adopted. For example, Air Emissions Accounts (AEA) and Physical Energy Flow Accounts (PEFA) are used as main data sources for allocating some taxes by economic activity. Both accounts are yearly revised due to changes in their own data sources (all changes are described in the national reports submitted with these accounts). To maintain the coherence between ETEA data and AEA/PEFA data, these changes are adopted each year inducing changes over the complete time series.

• The complete times series is actualized at each revision of the National Accounts (NA).

Methodological revisions can be divided into:

• Benchmark revisions, which are induced by new or revised basic data and new methods.
• Conceptual revisions, which are induced by new international recommendations.

At this stage, benchmark revisions are irregular and occur at an undefined pace, which may be defined more precisely in the coming years. The pace of conceptual revisions depends on revisions of the international recommendations.

In the case of such revisions, data for the complete time series are recalculated according to the new data or concepts and nomenclatures of the new system.

Non-scheduled revisions :

Such revisions may be necessary in order to correct any errors.

Revisions in the 2023 ETEA questionnaire:

- Some source data have been revised and these changes have been taken into account. In particular, Air Emissions Accounts (AEA) and Physical Energy Flow Accounts (PEFA) data are yearly revised (see section 17.1 for more details). As the breakdown by NACE activities of energy taxes is mainly based on these two accounts, while the breakdown of transport and pollution taxes is mainly based on AEA data, these changes are adopted each year in ETEA in order to maintain the coherence between ETEA and AEA/PEFA data, inducing revisions over the complete time series.

- As some source data are not available at T+16 months, the results for the year 2021 are considered provisional, meaning that revisions of these values are to be expected. Due to the same reason, data for the year 2020 have been revised compared to the results published last year.

See concept 17.1.

The transmitted data can be considered as final. The only exception are the data provided for the last year that have to be considered provisional.

Moreover, ETEA data depends on some data sources that are generally affected by changes or revisions from one year to the next (see concept 17.1. for more detail). Thus, further revisions of ETEA data are likely to happen in the next years, without being able to specify in advance which years or NACE sectors will be affected.

Some administrative data sources are sometimes used, when available, for allocating taxes by economic activity. This is the case, for example, for data used to allocate the CO₂ levy on fossil fuels (combustible), for which each reimbursement is registered by the Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN), with administrative data (name, address, etc.) related to the enterprise that benefits from a reimbursement of the tax. Such information allow to identify the economic activity of each enterprise quite precisely by matching it with the Business and Enterprise Register (BER).

The Household Budget Survey (HBS) is used as a first step for allocating some taxes between the households and the economy. It is a random survey, spread out across the seven major regions of Switzerland. About 3000 households take part each year. They are chosen randomly from the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (FSO) random sample register. Household data is weighted according to the including probability as well as taking into account certain other variables which may lead to a household not taking part in the survey. A calibration method based on the known distribution of the Swiss population is applied. It enables to compensate for a possible bias in the selection of households. The HBS results are therefore based on a household structure, which accurately represents the permanent resident population in Switzerland. The response rate of this survey is about 30%.

Statistical estimations are used in some cases in which no other data source is available. For example, information about the allocation of the revenue by economic activity is not available for the whole time frame for some taxes. This is the case, for example, for data used to allocate the incentive tax on volatile organic compounds (VOC), which is collected only every three years. For the missing years among the surveys, the allocation by economic activity is estimated with regression analysis.

Different approaches are applied for the attribution of the taxes’ revenues to the various economic activities. The main approach is based on the use of data provided by Air Emissions Accounts (AEA) or Physical Energy Flow Accounts (PEFA). This approach works well when the tax base is a product for which the correlation between consumption and the tax levied is high, such as fuel for example. The allocation of the revenue of the tax on Non-Methane Volatile Organic Compounds (NMVOC) linked to solvent use is based on detailed raw data from the database used by the Federal Office for the Environment to establish the Greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory.

Source data are collected annually. A part of the source data used for the allocation of taxes by economic activity are available at T+21 months. This is notably the case for the Air Emissions Accounts (AEA) and Physical Energy Flow Accounts (PEFA) data. As some source data are not available at T+16 months, the results of the breakdown by NACE activities for the year 2021 are considered provisional.

Some source data come from other Swiss federal offices, from cantons or from other organisations. For each source data, a request is addressed every year (approximately in the same period) to a contact person in order to collect the data. Thus, source data are generally made available as customised data extractions at request and are received in the form of an Excel file. The same file is generally reused year after year and simply completed with the additional year. It allows to facilitate the updating by keeping the same structure. In addition, it allows the data provider to check easily if the data delivered the previous year remain the same or if there are changes.

Controls and plausibility checks are implemented as often as possible in the various steps of the production process in order to detect possible problems as early as possible. The source data is mainly controlled by checking the changes from year to year and also by comparing it with other data sources when available. If some data seems suspicious, the data provider is contacted to get additional information and clarify.

The output data are mainly controlled by comparing the results with the results of the previous data transmission. These controls are implemented for each tax at the NACE level. The changes are analysed both in absolute and relative terms. Relatively important variations have to be clarified and explained by checking the entire production process and by analysing the source data in more detail.

Some totals and subtotals (e.g. NACE section) are derived by summing data at a more disaggregated level (e.g. NACE positions).

Not applicable.

The first distinction usually made when allocating the taxes’ revenues by economic actors, when applicable, is among residents in Switzerland (households and enterprises) and non-residents (see concept 18.5.4. for more detail). Then, the residents in Switzerland have to be allocated between households and enterprises. For some taxes, data from the Household Budget Survey (HBS) is used to do it (see concept 18.1. for more detail). Then, additional information is required to allocate between the NACE positions.

Concerning environmentally related taxes’ exemptions, mainly two type of approaches can be distinguished. For some taxes, exemptions are defined by law so that some economic activities might be free of taxation either entirely or for the use of specific products/services otherwise usually taxed (e.g. fuel consumption for agriculture). For those taxes where information regarding individual firms are available, exemptions are treated for each single economic activity individually. In these cases, confidential data regarding individual firms being exempted or reimbursed for their taxes’ payments are made available and organized by economic activity using the Business and Enterprise Register (BER). This is the case of the CO₂-levy, for which confidential data is used. Similarly, to assess tax exemptions for the “Feed-in remuneration at cost” as well as for the incentive tax on volatile organic compounds (VOC), data collected by a private institute are used.

Some source data used for the breakdown by NACE activities are not available at T+16 months. When possible, such data are estimated by using other available data that are likely to be linked.

The first distinction usually made when allocating the taxes’ revenues by economic actors, when applicable, is among residents in Switzerland (households and enterprises) and non-residents. When available, this distinction is based directly on government’s figures. Otherwise, it has to be based on other data sources (e.g. Air Emissions Accounts (AEA) or Physical Energy Flow Accounts (PEFA)).

Tax allocation among economic actors is estimated also for the years before 2008 (starting in 1990) in NACE Rev.2. However, since the quality level for detailed data prior to such date is lower, environmentally related taxes’ revenue by economic activity are delivered according to the NACE sections only. For the same reasons, before 2000, data are available by economic sector (primary, secondary and tertiary) only.

Not relevant.

Not applicable.

In Switzerland, the methodology for the taxes’ revenue allocation allows producing a first version of the environmentally related taxes accounts in homogeneous branches (or at least as close as possible to this concept). However, in Switzerland, the National Accounts (NA) are calculated according to the “enterprise concept”. Therefore to produce a dataset compatible with the NA, we calculate a second version of the environmentally related taxes accounts by using the Swiss Input-Output Table (CPA by NACE). More precisely, we pragmatically use the IOT 2014, for the whole time period analysed. This second version of the environmentally related taxes accounts is compatible to economic data published in Switzerland and transmitted to Eurostat (e.g. gross value added).

Finally, data reported under “Other environmentally related payments to government (fees and charges)” comprise the three following types of environmentally related tax levies:

- fees paid for an individual service rendered in return from the government (e.g. communal fees for waste elimination);

- mixed forms that cannot be clearly classified as taxes or fees or that are ordered by the government but collected by a private organisation (e.g. airport landing surtax);

- private voluntary solutions, managed by sectoral associations and likely to become law if the environmental goals set are not achieved (e.g. prepaid recycling tax for PET bottles).