Reference metadata describe statistical concepts and methodologies used for the collection and generation of data. They provide information on data quality and, since they are strongly content-oriented, assist users in interpreting the data. Reference metadata, unlike structural metadata, can be decoupled from the data.
[ES1] National Institute for Statistics (INE) (Spain)
1.2. Contact organisation unit
SHORT-TERM STATISTICS DIRECTORATE
1.3. Contact name
Confidential because of GDPR
1.4. Contact person function
Confidential because of GDPR
1.5. Contact mail address
1.6. Contact email address
Confidential because of GDPR
1.7. Contact phone number
Confidential because of GDPR
1.8. Contact fax number
Confidential because of GDPR
2.1. Metadata last certified
31 December 2024
2.2. Metadata last posted
31 December 2024
2.3. Metadata last update
31 December 2024
3.1. Data description
Statistics on international supply of services (ISS) by modes of supply (MoS) show how and where services are supplied internationally, namely by answering the question of 'how' services are exchanged across countries and 'where' services are supplied to foreign customers. Detailed information on international supply of services statistics by services category, mode of supply and partner country help policymakers carry out the ongoing and future trade negotiating agenda with facts and strong, evidence-based arguments and they allow to monitor the impact of services trade agreements.
The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), the first multilateral agreement to cover trade in services, defines trade in services as the supply of a service through any of four modes of supply, outlined in the bullet points below.
Mode 1 - cross-border supply: from the territory of one country into the territory of another country; Mode 2 - consumption abroad: in the territory of one country to the service consumer of another country; Mode 3 - commercial presence: by a service supplier of one country, through a commercial presence in the territory of another country. The FATS framework is designed to provide information on the activities of enterprises located in foreign markets; Mode 4 - presence of natural persons: by a service supplier of one country, through the presence of natural persons of that country in the territory of any other country.
Total international supply of services (total of modes 1, 2, 3 and 4)
Mode 1 (‘cross border transactions’),
Mode 2 (‘consumption abroad’),
Mode 3 (‘commercial presence’), and
Mode 4 (‘presence of natural persons’).
3.5. Statistical unit
Not applicable.
3.6. Statistical population
Total international supply of services by all four modes of supply.
3.7. Reference area
Spain
3.8. Coverage - Time
Year 2024 (provisional)
3.9. Base period
Not applicable.
Data are reported in national currency (thousands).
Eurostat disseminates data in million euro.
Calendar year.
6.1. Institutional Mandate - legal acts and other agreements
Regulation (EU) 2019/2152 on European business statistics sets the data requirements in the field of international supply of services by modes for the EU Member States and EFTA countries. The exact technical specifications are listed in Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/1197. The requirements concerning the MoS domain are defined in table 38 "Statistics on international activities – International Supply of Services by Mode of Supply – annual data" of the Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/1197. The variable must be reported annually with first reference year 2023.
6.2. Institutional Mandate - data sharing
INE is the responsible agency for MoS production in Spain.
The main inputs for MoS are:
1) International Trade in Services (ITS) yearly data produced by the National Central Bank (Banco de España) under the BoP domain.
2) Quarterly ITS Survey data (QITSS). QITSS is elaborated by INE mainly from direct reporting of a sample of enterprises. It is one of the main inputs for BoP Other services.
3) FATS statistics elaborated by INE and other institutions and integrated and co-ordinated by INE.
4) TEC statistics elaborated by Customs (Tax agency).
5) SBS statistics elaborated by INE and other institutions and integrated and co-ordinated by INE.
INE and Banco de España hold a bilateral agreement to exchange data in both directions both for the production of BoP "Other Services" requirements and for MoS.
INE and Customs (Tax agency) also hold a bilateral agreement (yearly reviewed) to exchange data in both directions exclusively for the production of statistics.
7.1. Confidentiality - policy
The Spanish Statistical Law No. 12/1989 specifies that the INE cannot publish, or make otherwise available, individual data or statistics that would enable the identification of data for any individual person or entity. Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 on European statistics stipulates the need to establish common principles and guidelines ensuring the confidentiality of data used for the production of European statistics and the access to those confidential data with due account for technical developments and the requirements of users in a democratic society.
7.2. Confidentiality - data treatment
INE provides information on the protection of confidentiality at all stages of the statistical process: INE questionnaires for the operations in the national statistical plan include a legal clause protecting data under statistical confidentiality. Notices prior to data collection announcing a statistical operation notify respondents that data are subject to statistical confidentiality at all stages. For data processing, INE employees have available the INE data protection handbook, which specifies the steps that should be taken at each stage of processing to ensure reporting units' individual data are protected.
Under no circumstances are users provided with data identifying the companies collaborating in the ITS survey that feed BoP and MoS, and in addition, any tailor-made statistical exploitation always preserves statistical secrecy in accordance with INE confidentiality standards. The only exception occurs when there are institutional agreements of information exchange with other government bodies with statistical competence exclusively for statistical use (e.g. Banco de España for BoP elaboration) or promotion of public trade policies linked to exports (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Enterprise).
For aggregate outputs: Cells with less than three units are labelled as confidential (primary confidentiality). Confidential cells (primary) are prevented to be disclosed by also applying secondary confidentiality techniques to avoid disclosure based on substraction from marginal totals or sub-totals.
For micro-level output: It is not foreseen to disseminate MoS microdata to users, as MoS is an analytics statistic whose main input is elaborated from different sources (macroeconomic statistics and surveys). See 6.2.
8.1. Release calendar
Following the INE's dissemination policy for structural statistics, the advance release calendar that shows the foreseen release month for MoS is dissseminated at the beginning of the year. However, the advance release calendar that shows the precise release date is disseminated two months before releasing.
The data are released simultaneously according to the advance release calendar to all interested parties by issuing the press release. At the same time, the data are posted on the INE's Internet website Intituto Nacional de Estadistica almost immediately after the press release is issued. Also some predefined tailor-made requests could be sent to registered users. Some users could receive partial information under embargo as it is publicly described in the European Statistics Code of Practice
Annual.
10.1. Dissemination format - News release
The results of the statistical operations are normally disseminated by using regular press releases that can be accessed via both the corresponding menu and the Press Releases Section in the web
10.2. Dissemination format - Publications
The results of MoS will be disseminated through the INE website on a yearly basis.
10.3. Dissemination format - online database
INEbase is the system the INE uses to store statistical information on the Internet. It contains all the information the INE produces in electronic formats. The primary organisation of the information follows the theme-based classification of the Inventory of Statistical Operations of the State General Administration . The basic unit of INEbase is the statistical operation, defined as the set of activities that lead to obtaining statistical results on a determined sector or subject based on the individually collected data. Also included in the scope of this definition are synthesis preparation.
10.3.1. Data tables - consultations
Not applicable.
10.4. Dissemination format - microdata access
A lot of statistical operations disseminate public domain anonymized files, available free of charge for downloading in the INE website Microdata Section.
However, no direct access is provided to the MoS microdata on the web, in line with the INE micro-data dissemination policy on enterprise surveys and macroeconomic statistics.
Quality assurance framework for the INE statistics is based on the ESSCoP, the European Statistics Code of Practice made by EUROSTAT. The ESSCoP is made up of 16 principles, gathered in three areas: Institutional Environment, Processes and Products. Each principle is associated with some indicators which make possible to measure it. In order to evaluate quality, EUROSTAT provides different tools: the indicators mentioned above, Self-assessment based on the DESAP model, peer review, user satisfaction surveys and other proceedings for evaluation.
The MoS statistic follows the Statistics Code of Practices. All phases of the statistical process of MoS (and their main sources ITS, QITSS, FATS, TEC and SBS) are subject to controls to ensure the quality of these statistical operations. The cleaning phases are exhaustive, implementing algorithms for the detection of completeness and statistical consistency errors in all the collection and recording tools. The phases of imputation and grossing-up of the QITSS and SBS/FATS sample information are governed by scientific principles of the theory of sampling in finite populations.
11.2. Quality management - assessment
In general, according to the information available from the quality reports, the data providers have applied the recommendations available in the Regulation (EU) 2019/2152.
12.1. Relevance - User Needs
Eurostat.
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Enterprise.
Banco de España.
12.2. Relevance - User Satisfaction
The INE has carried out general user satisfaction surveys in 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016 and 2019 and it plans to continue doing so every three years. The purpose of these surveys is to find out what users think about the quality of the information of the INE statistics and the extent to which their needs of information are covered. In addition, additional surveys are carried out in order to acknowledge better other fields such as dissemination of the information, quality of some publications...
On the INE website, in its section Methods and Projects / Quality and Code of Practice / INE quality management / User surveys are available surveys conducted to date.(Click next link)
MoS, as a new statistic, has not been assessed yet by users.
12.3. Completeness
MoS mets all the EBS Regulation requirements as regards this statistic, going even beyond compulsory data.
12.3.1. Data completeness - rate
R1. Ratio of available European statistics = 100% . All requested results are provided.
13.1. Accuracy - overall
MoS is estimated by using several sources (see 6.2): ITS (BoP), QITSS (Quarterly International Trade in Services Survey), FATS (Foreign Affiliates Statistics), TEC (Trade by Enterprise Characteristics) and SBS (Structural Business Statistics) among others. It is not possible to give an overall measure of accuracy, as it will depend on its sources' accuracy.
As regards QITSS and SBS/IFATS, their sample designs attempt to minimise sampling errors; the different processes of the surveys are aimed at eliminating or reducing, as far as possible, non-sampling errors, both in the collection phase (response rate and cleaning control) and in the subsequent editing and imputation phases. The collection process, coverage control, cleaning of errors and imputation of non-response allows us to obtain a high degree of reliability.
13.2. Sampling error
Not applicable
13.2.1. Sampling error - indicators
Not applicable.
13.3. Non-sampling error
MoS is estimated by using several statistical sources. It is not possible to give an overall measure of non-sampling error, as it will depend on its sources'.
As regards QITSS and SBS/FATS, non-sampling errors are minimised at each stage of the statistical process. In general, the questionnaires in all formats (paper, electronic or web) are designed with an explanatory annex to limit as much as possible errors on the part of respondents. In the case of recorders and cleaners, controls are established that do not allow recording a questionnaire that does not pass these controls, in order to limit recording errors and lack of consistency. They are also given ranges of temporal variation of different study variables on historical information.
The processes of imputation of non-response use historical information of the unit that does not answer, as long as it is available, and in its absence, the "next neighbour" technique is used for QITSS. In addition, there is a range of solutions for the treatment of field events arising from closures, mergers, divisions, unreachable, etc. of the companies surveyed so that the final process of grossing-up and estimation is not affected.
13.3.1. Coverage error
The target population for MoS is made up of: 1. Any trade in services resident operator trading with no residents, and 2. the resident foreign affiliate/branch (being a market producer enterprise) that sell services locally irrespective of whether it also exports/imports services.
MoS (M1, M2 and M4) must be elaborated from ITSS_BoP whose target population is comprised of resident institutional units who export or import services. Accordingly, QITSS as a main input for most of ITSS "Other services" EBOPS items, covers institutional units trading services. Thanks to that, there is no divergence between MoS (M1, M2 and M4) target population and the frame population of ITSS/QITSS.
Another different issue is whether QITSS statistical framework has some coverage error with respect to STEC target population. Any sample business survey can have some coverage error, especially if there is not a full consistent business register for the phenomenon to be measured. The existence of a complete and regularly updated register of services exporters/importers is not very common. In the case of QITSS, we use the VIES register of intra-EU services operators as a starting point, given that most of these operators also trade in services with extra-EU countries. To supplement this framework, we use historical and current information from ITRS operators who declared extra-EU receipts/payments, exclusively. We also use as an additional framework, Customs information from INTRASTAT/EXTRASTAT on the operators/operations with NoT (nature of transaction) codes 4 and 5, to identify potential manufacturing services and repairing services traders. By using all these statistical frames we minimise the QITSS coverage error.
MoS (M3) must be elaborated from FATS whose target population is comprised of the resident foreign affiliates/branches in Spain from foreign MNE groups (IFATS) , and the non-resident affiliates/branches of Spanish MNEs located abroad (OFATS), in both cases both market producer enterprises. Fortunately, the IFATS frame is the NSBR (National Statistical Business Register) and its "Profiling", and for OFATS we have EGR and FDI populations. In both cases, the statistical frames are coincident with those of MoS (M3), minimising coverage error.
13.3.1.1. Over-coverage - rate
Not applicable.
13.3.1.2. Common units - proportion
Not applicable.
13.3.2. Measurement error
See item 13.3. Non-sampling error.
13.3.3. Non response error
Not applicable.
13.3.3.1. Unit non-response - rate
Not applicable.
13.3.3.2. Item non-response - rate
Not applicable.
13.3.4. Processing error
See item 13.3. Non-sampling error.
13.3.5. Model assumption error
Not applicable.
14.1. Timeliness
Annual data for Modes of Supply 1, 2 and 4 shall be provided by the reporting countries to Eurostat no later than 10 months after the end of the reference year and data for Mode 3 shall be provided by the reporting countries to Eurostat no later than 22 months after the end of the reference year.
14.1.1. Time lag - first result
Not applicable.
14.1.2. Time lag - final result
Two years.
14.2. Punctuality
Not applicable.
14.2.1. Punctuality - delivery and publication
Not applicable.
15.1. Comparability - geographical
MoS is a European and national statistic and therefore not designed to provide regional information.
The use of international and European definitions and classifications contained in the commonly accepted international manuals on MoS, international trade in services and balance of payments, and FATS and EBS manuals, allows geographical comparability not only at European but also at international level.
15.1.1. Asymmetry for mirror flow statistics - coefficient
Not applicable.
15.2. Comparability - over time
2024-2023
15.2.1. Length of comparable time series
Length of comparable time series (CC2) = 2.
MoS data is available since referenc year 2023.
15.3. Coherence - cross domain
MoS (M1, M2 and M4) is elaborated from ITS (BoP) so is fully coherent with BoP Services statistics, and M3 from FATS, so is fully coherent with the European Business Statistics domain.
15.3.1. Coherence - sub annual and annual statistics
Not applicable.
15.3.2. Coherence - National Accounts
Not applicable.
15.4. Coherence - internal
There is no problem of internal coherence in the data of MoS.
36.9 thousand euros (INE's 2025 Budget)
17.1. Data revision - policy
EBS Regulation does foresee data revision for MoS (M1, M2 and M4) a year after, at the moment of delivering M3 and Total modes (M1+M2+M3+M4).
17.2. Data revision - practice
The general policy revision in practice for a reference year T is:
M1, M2 and M4 (delivered T+10M). Data revision expected in T+22M.
M3 and Total modes M1+M2+M3+M4 (delivered T+22M). Not revised.
17.2.1. Data revision - average size
Not applicable.
18.1. Source data
The main sources for MoS are:
1) International Trade in Services (BoP_ITS): Yearly data produced by the National Central Bank (Banco de España) under the BoP domain. Elaborated from different basic statistical sources, administrative registers and additional information to comply with international standards (BPM6/MECIS 2010). As regards "Other services" item, the main input is QITSS. BoP_ITS is the main source for M1, M2 and M4 combined with QITSS information on MoS.
2) Quarterly ITS Survey data (QITSS): Elaborated by INE for BoP/NA ("Other services") purposes, mainly from direct reporting of a sample of enterprises . It is one of the main inputs for BoP Other services. Characteristics:
Stratified random sampling survey on enterprises mainly belonging to VIES population (EU VAT Information Exchange System) restricted to intra-EU services operators, and to the INE's NSBR, plus other supplementary frameworks. The stratification variables are: activity, size, control and VIES taxable figure for services declarations.
QITSS estimates of exports and imports of "Other services" BoP account by EBOPS item, partner country and MoS (predominant mode is collected by direct reporting), are obtained by grossing up the figures directly reported by the sample of enterprises.
3) FATS statistics: Elaborated by INE and other institutions and integrated and co-ordinated by INE. IFATS (Inward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of foreign affiliates under foreign control resident in Spain. OFATS (Outward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of affiliates located abroad under Spanish control. FATS is recommended as the main source for M3 (commercial presence). However, the share of foreign affiliates turnover generated by the services sold locally by EBOPS item (M3 target), is not directly provided by FATS. Some steps are taken to pass from total net turnover/output figures by economic activity (NACE) collected by FATS to M3 final figures. FATS are also used to estimate Distribution services provided by M3.
IFATS information is exhaustively gathered from SBS questionnaires: All foreign affiliates resident in Spain are surveyed (census).
OFATS information is gathered from several sources: Outward FDI microdata records, combined with EGR and NSBR, and other external sources.
4) TEC statistics: Elaborated by Customs (Tax agency) by linking, at microdata level, FTS (Foreign Trade Statistics) to NSBR (INE) to characterise the exporters/importers of merchandise. It allows to enrich FTS information by counterpart country and product, with additional information such as the economic activity, size and control of traders, among others. TEC information is the basic source to estimate Distribution services provided by M1 as it allows to identify the wholesalers/retailers classified in NACE section G Commerce (target population of exporters of Distribution services).
5) SBS statistics: Elaborated by INE and other institutions and integrated and co-ordinated by INE. It collects a lot of economic variables for a set of sampled enterprises (market producers) whose main economic activity (NACE) is under the population scope of SBS. NSBR is used as main sample framework. SBS main role in MoS is just to estimate the trade margin of wholesalers/retailers (on the resale of goods without further processing). For that purpose, the trade margin is estimated by calculating the ratio (Gross margin of goods for resale / Net turnover), both variables available in SBS for wholesalers/retailers. These trade margins (from SBS) multiplied by the exports of wholesalers/retailers (TEC), result in a good estimation of Distribution services (exports) provided by M1.
6) Other statistics: Some other statistical sources are residually used to compile MoS. For instance, Tourist Expenditure Survey (EGATUR) and Resident Tourism Survey (ETR) are used to estimate the share of expenditure for goods to total tourist expenditure, just to substract it from BoP_Travel item (credits and debits, respectively) for M2 estimation purposes, as MoS methodology (GATS) is only focused on the service component of EBOPS items. The BoP_Goodsaccount is also used to help estimate Distribution services provided by M1 (imports).
18.2. Frequency of data collection
Annual.
18.3. Data collection
1. BoP_ITS (International Trade in Services)/BoP_Goods account: These figures come directly from Banco de España through a secure channel of electronic data transmission.
2. QITSS (Quarterly International Trade in Services Survey): There are two main different formats for QITSS questionnaires (paper_PAPI and web_CAWI), however some large enterprises with many quarterly transactions are allowed to use an excel spreadsheet. The respondent can choose the format that best suits their needs and transmit the information by ordinary mail, fax, e-mail or, like the vast majority of reporters, through the INE web platform for collecting economic data (IRIA). The access to IRIA is done through: INE-IRIA - National institute of statistics survey . The link to the QITSS questionnaire in paper: INE - International Trade in Services questionnaire
INE tries to minimise the non-response through telephone or e-mail contact with the respondents and, once the submission deadline has expired, through the sanctioning procedure. Moreover, the CAWI questionnaire has implemented an online editing system to detect errors and make respondents correct them just in time. A similar editing system is also implemented in the software that fieldwork agents use to record and debug the non-CAWI questionnaires. If the questionnaire is not received in a given quarter, its information is imputed on the basis of the latest data of the unit that does not respond by updating it with the information of the units in its stratum that did respond in the reference quarter. If there is no historical information, it is imputed by the "next neighbour" procedure.
3. TEC data: These figures come directly from Customs (Tax agency) through a secure channel of electronic data transmission shared by all bodies of national administration (Data store where TEC microdata on wholesalers/retailers are only available temporarily under a set of passwords).
4. SBS/FATS/EGATUR/ETR data: These figures come directly from another INE's Unit. Microdata are available in the shared computer network of INE under authorisation for SBS/FATS. Aggregated data for EGATUR/ETR are sent by email.
18.4. Data validation
Being MoS a multisource statistic, MoS data validation is linked to the data validation of sources involved.
The INE's own collection and recording application for the QITSS makes it possible to implement validation rules for the information contained in the questionnaires. These rules are divided into serious and weak errors. The first are usually basic errors of completeness and consistency, which do not allow recording the questionnaire and require the recorders to contact the statistical unit. The weak ones are controls that have to do more with the statistical coherence of the information (that there are no outliers, etc.) and although they allow to continue with the recording of the questionnaire they send a warning message. In the case of the electronic questionnaire (CAWI), it is the questionnaire itself that implements these validation rules, so that it is the respondent himself who corrects the error in the event of a mistake.
Also, in a second phase of cleaning and validation there are rules for controlling variation ranges in exports and imports declared by respondents who report in the event that these quarterly and annual variations are outside the established ranges. This control is prioritised for the most important statistical units in terms of exported or imported value, since their weight may have a greater influence on the totals.
18.5. Data compilation
Being MoS a multisource statistic, MoS data compilation is linked to the data compilation of the different sources involved. QITSS and SBS/IFATS are sample surveys (direct reporting) but BoP_ITS, that uses QITSS like main input, is a macroeconomic statistic (BoP) fed with some other different sources. OFATS is mostly based on an administrative register (Outward FDI) combined with statistical registers (NSBR, EGR) and some other information, and finally TEC is a combination of statistics (FTS) and statistical register (NSBR) linked by MDL.
Given this multifactorial nature of MoS and of some of its sources, it is not possible to describe a generic procedure for MoS imputation, and its impact on figures or adjustments for non-response, nor calculations and corrections on design weights. This would be only possible for a direct reporting source as QITSS but not for the rest of sources who feed MoS.
So, in the context of data compilation we can just include the procedure for combining the input data from the above different sources to obtain MoS:
1. BoP_ITS provided by EBOPS and partner country is the starting point to produce MoS (M1, M2 and M4) figures. However, BoP_ITS has no information on MoS.
2. QITSS is a sample survey on legal units (LEU) used as a main input for most of the BoP_ITS EBOPS items. After all the statistical process (cleaning, recording, editing and validation, imputation), QITSS sample figures must be grossed up to total population. As the collection unit for QITSS is the LEU but the statistical unit is the ENT, we impute data for those LEU being also part of a sample ENT that were not selected and therefore not surveyed. Finally, the sample figures for each sample enterprise are obtained, either from the surveyed LEU or from the imputed LEU, just to get the total sample value of the ENT. The final estimates at ENT level are calculated by using "indirect sampling techniques" based on the methodology presented by Lavallée and Labelle-Blanchet in the paper: “Indirect Sampling applied to Skewed Population”, Survey Methodology, junio 2013, Vol 39, Statistics Canada. The final QITSS microdata with their weights are transmitted to Banco de España to estimate BoP_ITS.
For each trade in service transaction by EBOPS and country, QITSS collects information on the predominant MoS what makes possible a distribution by mode of BoP_ITS data after removing the share of goods from selected EBOPS items: Maintenance and repair, Travel, Construction and Government. QITSS questionnaire asks respondents directly for the share of goods on Maintenance and repair, Construction and Government. For Travel item, the removal of goods value is made indirectly through the information gathered by EGATUR and ETR (basic sources used in the estimation of BoP_Travel item) on the share of expenditure for goods to total tourist expenditure.
3. TEC and SBS data are used to estimate Distribution services provided by M1. TEC allows to identify the wholesalers/retailers exporting goods classified in NACE section G Commerce (target population of exporters of Distribution services). SBS main role in MoS is just to estimate the trade margin of wholesalers/retailers (on the resale of goods without further processing). For that purpose, the trade margin is estimated by calculating the ratio (Gross margin of goods for resale / Net turnover), both variables available in SBS for wholesalers/retailers. These trade margins (from SBS) multiplied by the exports of wholesalers/retailers (TEC), result in a good estimation of Distribution services (exports) provided by M1.
4. IFATS (Inward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of foreign affiliates under foreign control resident in Spain. OFATS (Outward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of affiliates located abroad under Spanish control. FATS is recommended as the main source for M3 (commercial presence). However, the share of foreign affiliates turnover generated by the services sold locally by EBOPS item (M3 target), is not directly provided by FATS. Some steps are taken to pass from total net turnover/output figures by economic activity (NACE) collected by FATS to M3 final figures:
First step: IFATS collects the net turnover of foreign affiliates according to the main economic activity, but also to the secondary and ancillary activities. This allows us to know the share of total net turnover generated by services activities, even for those affiliates whose main economic activity is not in the services sector. Moreover, IFATS provides us with the shares of net turnover generated in/out of Spain what allows to know the share of services sold locally by these IFATS foreign affiliates (M3 target). In the case of OFATS, only the main economic activity is available in FDI microdata records. However, the FDI administrative form includes a question of the share of services sold locally (M3 target).
Second step: As FATS are producer oriented, only the NACE codes are available (no information on the services products by any product classification is available). As FATS data on services sold locally estimated from the first step are only classified by the NACE code of the service supplier, a conversion table NACE-EBOPS must be used to get those services sold locally by EBOPS items, just to integrate M3 data with those of M1, M2 and M4 with a common product classification of services (EBOPS). This table is elaborated from Eurostat/WTO NACE-EBOPS conversion table included in the MoS Compilation Guide.
FATS are also used to estimate Distribution services provided by M3: Imports are estimated from "output" variable collected in IFATS for foreign affiliates in section G of NACE (Commerce), as "output" is a very suitable estimate of wholesalers/retailers' trade margin. On the contrary, as "output" is not available in OFATS, exports are estimated by multiplying the variable "Turnover" collected in OFATS for foreign affiliates under control of Spain in section G of NACE (Commerce), by the ratio (Output /Turnover) from IFATS.
18.5.1. Imputation - rate
Not applicable to MoS as it is a multisource statistical product elaborated from sample surveys, macro economic statistics and other sources what makes not possible to calculate an overall imputation rate.
18.6. Adjustment
Not applicable.
18.6.1. Seasonal adjustment
Not applicable.
Statistics on international supply of services (ISS) by modes of supply (MoS) show how and where services are supplied internationally, namely by answering the question of 'how' services are exchanged across countries and 'where' services are supplied to foreign customers. Detailed information on international supply of services statistics by services category, mode of supply and partner country help policymakers carry out the ongoing and future trade negotiating agenda with facts and strong, evidence-based arguments and they allow to monitor the impact of services trade agreements.
The General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), the first multilateral agreement to cover trade in services, defines trade in services as the supply of a service through any of four modes of supply, outlined in the bullet points below.
Mode 1 - cross-border supply: from the territory of one country into the territory of another country; Mode 2 - consumption abroad: in the territory of one country to the service consumer of another country; Mode 3 - commercial presence: by a service supplier of one country, through a commercial presence in the territory of another country. The FATS framework is designed to provide information on the activities of enterprises located in foreign markets; Mode 4 - presence of natural persons: by a service supplier of one country, through the presence of natural persons of that country in the territory of any other country.
Total international supply of services (total of modes 1, 2, 3 and 4)
Mode 1 (‘cross border transactions’),
Mode 2 (‘consumption abroad’),
Mode 3 (‘commercial presence’), and
Mode 4 (‘presence of natural persons’).
Not applicable.
Total international supply of services by all four modes of supply.
Spain
Calendar year.
MoS is estimated by using several sources (see 6.2): ITS (BoP), QITSS (Quarterly International Trade in Services Survey), FATS (Foreign Affiliates Statistics), TEC (Trade by Enterprise Characteristics) and SBS (Structural Business Statistics) among others. It is not possible to give an overall measure of accuracy, as it will depend on its sources' accuracy.
As regards QITSS and SBS/IFATS, their sample designs attempt to minimise sampling errors; the different processes of the surveys are aimed at eliminating or reducing, as far as possible, non-sampling errors, both in the collection phase (response rate and cleaning control) and in the subsequent editing and imputation phases. The collection process, coverage control, cleaning of errors and imputation of non-response allows us to obtain a high degree of reliability.
Data are reported in national currency (thousands).
Eurostat disseminates data in million euro.
Being MoS a multisource statistic, MoS data compilation is linked to the data compilation of the different sources involved. QITSS and SBS/IFATS are sample surveys (direct reporting) but BoP_ITS, that uses QITSS like main input, is a macroeconomic statistic (BoP) fed with some other different sources. OFATS is mostly based on an administrative register (Outward FDI) combined with statistical registers (NSBR, EGR) and some other information, and finally TEC is a combination of statistics (FTS) and statistical register (NSBR) linked by MDL.
Given this multifactorial nature of MoS and of some of its sources, it is not possible to describe a generic procedure for MoS imputation, and its impact on figures or adjustments for non-response, nor calculations and corrections on design weights. This would be only possible for a direct reporting source as QITSS but not for the rest of sources who feed MoS.
So, in the context of data compilation we can just include the procedure for combining the input data from the above different sources to obtain MoS:
1. BoP_ITS provided by EBOPS and partner country is the starting point to produce MoS (M1, M2 and M4) figures. However, BoP_ITS has no information on MoS.
2. QITSS is a sample survey on legal units (LEU) used as a main input for most of the BoP_ITS EBOPS items. After all the statistical process (cleaning, recording, editing and validation, imputation), QITSS sample figures must be grossed up to total population. As the collection unit for QITSS is the LEU but the statistical unit is the ENT, we impute data for those LEU being also part of a sample ENT that were not selected and therefore not surveyed. Finally, the sample figures for each sample enterprise are obtained, either from the surveyed LEU or from the imputed LEU, just to get the total sample value of the ENT. The final estimates at ENT level are calculated by using "indirect sampling techniques" based on the methodology presented by Lavallée and Labelle-Blanchet in the paper: “Indirect Sampling applied to Skewed Population”, Survey Methodology, junio 2013, Vol 39, Statistics Canada. The final QITSS microdata with their weights are transmitted to Banco de España to estimate BoP_ITS.
For each trade in service transaction by EBOPS and country, QITSS collects information on the predominant MoS what makes possible a distribution by mode of BoP_ITS data after removing the share of goods from selected EBOPS items: Maintenance and repair, Travel, Construction and Government. QITSS questionnaire asks respondents directly for the share of goods on Maintenance and repair, Construction and Government. For Travel item, the removal of goods value is made indirectly through the information gathered by EGATUR and ETR (basic sources used in the estimation of BoP_Travel item) on the share of expenditure for goods to total tourist expenditure.
3. TEC and SBS data are used to estimate Distribution services provided by M1. TEC allows to identify the wholesalers/retailers exporting goods classified in NACE section G Commerce (target population of exporters of Distribution services). SBS main role in MoS is just to estimate the trade margin of wholesalers/retailers (on the resale of goods without further processing). For that purpose, the trade margin is estimated by calculating the ratio (Gross margin of goods for resale / Net turnover), both variables available in SBS for wholesalers/retailers. These trade margins (from SBS) multiplied by the exports of wholesalers/retailers (TEC), result in a good estimation of Distribution services (exports) provided by M1.
4. IFATS (Inward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of foreign affiliates under foreign control resident in Spain. OFATS (Outward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of affiliates located abroad under Spanish control. FATS is recommended as the main source for M3 (commercial presence). However, the share of foreign affiliates turnover generated by the services sold locally by EBOPS item (M3 target), is not directly provided by FATS. Some steps are taken to pass from total net turnover/output figures by economic activity (NACE) collected by FATS to M3 final figures:
First step: IFATS collects the net turnover of foreign affiliates according to the main economic activity, but also to the secondary and ancillary activities. This allows us to know the share of total net turnover generated by services activities, even for those affiliates whose main economic activity is not in the services sector. Moreover, IFATS provides us with the shares of net turnover generated in/out of Spain what allows to know the share of services sold locally by these IFATS foreign affiliates (M3 target). In the case of OFATS, only the main economic activity is available in FDI microdata records. However, the FDI administrative form includes a question of the share of services sold locally (M3 target).
Second step: As FATS are producer oriented, only the NACE codes are available (no information on the services products by any product classification is available). As FATS data on services sold locally estimated from the first step are only classified by the NACE code of the service supplier, a conversion table NACE-EBOPS must be used to get those services sold locally by EBOPS items, just to integrate M3 data with those of M1, M2 and M4 with a common product classification of services (EBOPS). This table is elaborated from Eurostat/WTO NACE-EBOPS conversion table included in the MoS Compilation Guide.
FATS are also used to estimate Distribution services provided by M3: Imports are estimated from "output" variable collected in IFATS for foreign affiliates in section G of NACE (Commerce), as "output" is a very suitable estimate of wholesalers/retailers' trade margin. On the contrary, as "output" is not available in OFATS, exports are estimated by multiplying the variable "Turnover" collected in OFATS for foreign affiliates under control of Spain in section G of NACE (Commerce), by the ratio (Output /Turnover) from IFATS.
The main sources for MoS are:
1) International Trade in Services (BoP_ITS): Yearly data produced by the National Central Bank (Banco de España) under the BoP domain. Elaborated from different basic statistical sources, administrative registers and additional information to comply with international standards (BPM6/MECIS 2010). As regards "Other services" item, the main input is QITSS. BoP_ITS is the main source for M1, M2 and M4 combined with QITSS information on MoS.
2) Quarterly ITS Survey data (QITSS): Elaborated by INE for BoP/NA ("Other services") purposes, mainly from direct reporting of a sample of enterprises . It is one of the main inputs for BoP Other services. Characteristics:
Stratified random sampling survey on enterprises mainly belonging to VIES population (EU VAT Information Exchange System) restricted to intra-EU services operators, and to the INE's NSBR, plus other supplementary frameworks. The stratification variables are: activity, size, control and VIES taxable figure for services declarations.
QITSS estimates of exports and imports of "Other services" BoP account by EBOPS item, partner country and MoS (predominant mode is collected by direct reporting), are obtained by grossing up the figures directly reported by the sample of enterprises.
3) FATS statistics: Elaborated by INE and other institutions and integrated and co-ordinated by INE. IFATS (Inward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of foreign affiliates under foreign control resident in Spain. OFATS (Outward FATS) provides information on the economic activity of affiliates located abroad under Spanish control. FATS is recommended as the main source for M3 (commercial presence). However, the share of foreign affiliates turnover generated by the services sold locally by EBOPS item (M3 target), is not directly provided by FATS. Some steps are taken to pass from total net turnover/output figures by economic activity (NACE) collected by FATS to M3 final figures. FATS are also used to estimate Distribution services provided by M3.
IFATS information is exhaustively gathered from SBS questionnaires: All foreign affiliates resident in Spain are surveyed (census).
OFATS information is gathered from several sources: Outward FDI microdata records, combined with EGR and NSBR, and other external sources.
4) TEC statistics: Elaborated by Customs (Tax agency) by linking, at microdata level, FTS (Foreign Trade Statistics) to NSBR (INE) to characterise the exporters/importers of merchandise. It allows to enrich FTS information by counterpart country and product, with additional information such as the economic activity, size and control of traders, among others. TEC information is the basic source to estimate Distribution services provided by M1 as it allows to identify the wholesalers/retailers classified in NACE section G Commerce (target population of exporters of Distribution services).
5) SBS statistics: Elaborated by INE and other institutions and integrated and co-ordinated by INE. It collects a lot of economic variables for a set of sampled enterprises (market producers) whose main economic activity (NACE) is under the population scope of SBS. NSBR is used as main sample framework. SBS main role in MoS is just to estimate the trade margin of wholesalers/retailers (on the resale of goods without further processing). For that purpose, the trade margin is estimated by calculating the ratio (Gross margin of goods for resale / Net turnover), both variables available in SBS for wholesalers/retailers. These trade margins (from SBS) multiplied by the exports of wholesalers/retailers (TEC), result in a good estimation of Distribution services (exports) provided by M1.
6) Other statistics: Some other statistical sources are residually used to compile MoS. For instance, Tourist Expenditure Survey (EGATUR) and Resident Tourism Survey (ETR) are used to estimate the share of expenditure for goods to total tourist expenditure, just to substract it from BoP_Travel item (credits and debits, respectively) for M2 estimation purposes, as MoS methodology (GATS) is only focused on the service component of EBOPS items. The BoP_Goodsaccount is also used to help estimate Distribution services provided by M1 (imports).
Annual.
Annual data for Modes of Supply 1, 2 and 4 shall be provided by the reporting countries to Eurostat no later than 10 months after the end of the reference year and data for Mode 3 shall be provided by the reporting countries to Eurostat no later than 22 months after the end of the reference year.
MoS is a European and national statistic and therefore not designed to provide regional information.
The use of international and European definitions and classifications contained in the commonly accepted international manuals on MoS, international trade in services and balance of payments, and FATS and EBS manuals, allows geographical comparability not only at European but also at international level.
