Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union

Unit F2: Population

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Data series on decisions on asylum applications and resettlement contain statistical information based on Article 4 of the Council Regulation (EC) no 862/2007 with reference to:

• First instance decisions by age, sex and citizenship
• Final decisions by age, sex and citizenship
• Decisions withdrawing status granted at first instance by type of status withdrawn and by citizenship
• Decisions withdrawing status granted as final decisions by type of status withdrawn and by citizenship
• Resettled persons by age, sex and citizenship

These data are supplied to Eurostat by the national Ministries of Interior and related official agencies. Data is presented country by country and for groups of countries: the European Member States and the European Economic Area (EEA).

Data are rounded to the nearest 5.

The classification of codes on the reporting country (GEO) and on the country of citizenship of asylum applicants (CITIZEN) corresponds to the ISO 3166 code-list (3166-1 alpha-2) with the exception of:

• United Kingdom where the code ""UK"" was adopted (instead of ""GB"") and
• Greece where the code ""EL"" was adopted (instead of ""GR"")

Asylum migration - international protection statistics

First instance decision: decisions (positive and negative) considering applications for international protection as well as the grants of authorisations to stay for humanitarian reasons, including decisions under priority and accelerated procedures taken by administrative or judicial bodies in Member States. First instance decisions include decisions granted to persons who are a subject of the Dublin Regulation (Council Regulation 604/2013/EC).

Final decision: decision taken by administrative or judicial bodies in appeal or in review and which are no longer subject to remedy. The true 'final instance' may be, according to the national legislation and administrative procedures, a decision of the highest national court. However, it is not intended that asylum statistics should cover rare or exceptional cases determined by the highest courts. Thus, the statistics related to the final decisions should refer to what is effectively a final decision in the vast majority of all cases: i.e. that all normal routes of appeal have been exhausted.

Refugee status means a person covered by a decision granting refugee status, taken by administrative or judicial bodies during the reference period. Refugee status means status as defined in Art.2(e) of Directive 2011/95/EU within the meaning of Art.1 of the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees of 28 July 1951, as amended by the New York Protocol of 31 January 1967.

Subsidiary protection status: means a person covered by a decision granting subsidiary protection status as defined in Art.2(g) of Directive 2011/95/EC i.e. 'the recognition by a Member State of a third country national or a stateless person as a person eligible for subsidiary protection'.

Temporary protection: means a person covered by a decision granting temporary protection as defined in Art.2(a) of Council Directive 2001/55/EC i.e. 'a procedure of exceptional character to provide, in the event of a mass influx or imminent mass influx of displaced persons from third countries who are unable to return to their country of origin, immediate and temporary protection to such persons, in particular if there is also a risk that the asylum system will be unable to process this influx without adverse effects for its efficient operation, in the interests of the persons concerned and other persons requesting protection'.

Authorisation to stay for humanitarian reasons: means a person covered by a decision granting authorisation to stay for humanitarian reasons under national law concerning international protection by administrative or judicial bodies. It includes persons who are not eligible for international protection as currently defined in the Qualifications Directive (Directive 2011/95/EU) but are nonetheless protected against removal under the obligations that are imposed on all Member States by international refugee or human rights instruments or on the basis of principles flowing from such instruments. Examples of such categories include persons who are not removable on ill health grounds and unaccompanied minors. This concept refers only to persons who have been previously reported as asylum applicants in the Asylum data collection. As a consequence, persons granted a permission to stay for humanitarian reasons but who have not previously applied for international protection are not included under this concept.

Resettled persons: persons who have been granted an authorisation to reside in a Member State within the framework of a national or Community resettlement scheme, where such a scheme is implemented in that Member State and relates to the Art.4.3(g) of the Regulation. Resettlement means the transfer of third country nationals or stateless persons on the basis of their need for international protection and a durable solution to a Member State, where they are permitted to reside with secure legal status. Data does not relate to resettled persons  who remain in the third country waiting for a transfer to the Member States or to persons covered by future resettlement commitments.

Eurostat further produces aggregates of the Total number of decisions and the Total number of positive decisions issued during a reference period, for each "stage in the procedure" (first instance or final instance). Thus, Total number of positive decisions refers to the sum of decisions granting refugee status, subsidiary protection status, authorisation to stay for humanitarian reasons (for countries where applicable) and temporary protection. Total number of decisions refers to Total number of positive decisions plus rejected applicants.

All data refer to the number of persons (see also "3.4. Statistical concepts and definitions").

The statistical polulation for statistics on Decisions on asylum applications and resettlement refers to:

• persons who are issued a first instance decision granting or rejecting a protection status during the reference period
• persons who are issued a final instance decision granting or rejecting a protection status during the reference period
• persons who are issued a first instance decision withdrawing a status of protection during the reference period
• persons who are issued a final instance decision withdrawing a status of protection during the reference period
• resettled persons during the reference period

in the area of EU Member States and in the EFTA countries.

Please further see concept "3.4. Statistical concepts and definitions".

EU Member States, Iceland, Norway, Liechtenstein and Switzerland.

Data are available since 1999. Council Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 applies to asylum statistics collected since January 2008.

Not applicable

The unit of measure is the absolute number of persons.

Calendar quarter for first insance decisions and calendar year for final instance decisions and resettled persons.

The compilation of statistics on asylum is based on Article 4 of Council Regulation (CE) No 862/2007 of 11 July 2007 which depicts in details the data provisions Member States are bound to supply Eurostat with.

Not applicable.

Regulation (EC) No 223/2009 on European statistics (recital 24 and Article 20(4)) of 11 March 2009 (OJ L 87, p. 164), 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.

Not applicable - data on Decisions on asylum applications and resettlement are not confidential.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

In line with the Community legal framework and the European Statistics Code of Practice Eurostat disseminates European statistics on Eurostat's website (see item 10 - 'Accessibility and clarity') respecting professional independence and in an objective, professional and transparent manner in which all users are treated equitably. The detailed arrangements are governed by the Eurostat protocol on impartial access to Eurostat data for users.

The database is updated two times per week, every Wednesday and Friday morning at 11.00 a.m..

Data on decisions on applications and resettlement are used in the frame of our annual News Release publications.

Our News Releases can be found under this portal: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/asylum-and-managed-migration/publications

Data on decisions on applications and resettlement are used regularly in the frame of our quarterly Data In Focus publications.

Our latest publications can be downloaded for free from this portal:
http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/asylum-and-managed-migration/publications

Moreover Eurostat produces statistical articles via the Statistics Explained platform. The Asylum_quarterly_report and the Asylum statistics articles describe recent short and long term developments in relation to numbers of asylum applicants and decisions on asylum applications in the European Union.

Please consult free data on-line or refer to contact details.

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Please see the annex on Technical Guidelines on asylum statistics.

Please refer as well to Article 4 of the Council Regulation (EC) No 862/2007

See annexes.

An Asylum Metadata questionnaire has been developped by Eurostat to ensure the compliance of Member States with requirements of Article 4 of Regulation (EC) 862/2007.
As given in the Article 9 of the Regulation, Member States must report to Eurostat on the data sources used, the reasons for the selection of these sources and the effects of the selected data on the quality of the statistics.

Member States compile the requested data following the guidelines and instructions provided by Eurostat. Before data publication, consistency validation checks are performed. 

Furtermore, in order to ensure that the statistical practices used to compile the Asylum data are in compliance with the methodological requirements and that good practices in the field of Asylum statistics are being followed, Eurostat organises every two years a dedicated Working Group on Asylum statistics where quality and methodological issues are discussed with the data providers (Member States). Eurostat also undertakes compliance monitoring visits to Member States, during which it reviews and consults the data providers on methodological issues.

Asylum statistics are mainly based on administrative sources. Certain differences in definitions and practices of producing asylum statistics exist between countires. However, with minor exceptions (see annexes) the Member States are following the requirements of the Regulation (EC) 862/2007 (first reporting period January 2008) and the quality of the data may be assessed as good or very good.

The main strengths of the Asylum statistics: relevance, accuracy, timeliness and punctuality, accessibility and clarity, coherence and comparability:

• Relevance: The key users of Asylum statistics are DG HOME AFFAIRS (migration and asylum policy), European Asylum Support Office, various N.G.O.'s and researchers, but also other Directorates General, like DG Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion and DG Justice. The data relevance can be assessed as good thanks to frequent informal and formal contacts with users.
• Accuracy: The accuracy of the Asylum data depend on the accuracy and efficiency of the underlying administrative source systems. However, many Member States have introduced more integrated and comprehensive administrative systems that make use of modern IT and communication methods. These developments have a strongly
  positive impact on the accuracy of the statistical data, broadly speaking. Finally, Asylum statistics benefit from established and efficient validation and compilation tools.
• Timeliness and punctuality: The Asylum statistics benefit from the well-established data collection and as well from the Regulation (EC) 862/2007 which defines certain deadlines for data transmission to Eurostat. The regulation specifies that the monthly and quarterly data must be reported to Eurostat not later than 2 months after the end of a reference period, while the annual data must be reported to Eurostat not later than 3 months after the end of the reference year. Due to the well established I.T. tools at Eurostat level, Asylum data are generally disseminated on a punctual manner immediately after they are transmitted to Eurostat, every Wednesday and Friday (given that the internal consistency of the data is ensured). Nevertheless, missing data can often impact on the punctuality of the release of certain publications (Data in Focus, Statistics Explained articles).
• Accessibility: All the different dissemination channels are used: electronic and paper publications, predefined main tables, databases, DVDs and FTP addresses for bulk downloads.
• Clarity: the dissemination of the Asylum statistics is supported by a complete set of structural and reference metadata making it possible to easily identify, retrieve and browse the data and their quality.
• Coherence and Comparability: Regulation (EC) 862/2007 ensures the harmonisation of the concepts and definitions applied by the Member States for reporting the Asylum data to Eurostat. Furtermore, the increased degree of harmonisation in the management of asylum systems in the EU (for example, through the implementation of the
  Common European Asylum System or via the support of the European Asylum Support Office) has helped to ensure that these administrative sources and the resulting statistical data are highly comparable.

Other recent actions and future plans on ensuring and enhancing the quality of Asylum data:

• In December 2013 the Technical Guidelines used for reporting Asylum data has been reviewed jointly by Eurostat, DG HOME AFFAIRS, FRONTEX and E.A.S.O. and in consultation with Member States. This exercise clarified certain concepts and definitions of Asylum data collection and helped to enhance the overall quality and comparability of the Asylum data across countries.
• Eurostat will launch a new round of Quality Questionnaire in Autumn 2014 to assess the quality and comparability of the concepts and definitions of Asylum data across countries and over time.
• The Working Group of April 2014 on Asylum, Residence Permit and Enforcement Statistics established a harmonised set of validation rules for Asylum data in order to enusre their internal coherence and consistency across countries.
• Eurostat has recently developed and provided to Member States an automatic web validation engine (EDIT) with which data providers can check the consistency of the Asylum data against the common established validation rules.

Users of Eurostat asylum statistics are:

• various policy DGs in the European Commission, like DG HOME AFFAIRS for desinging, funding and implementing asylum related policies in the EU
• the European Parliament
• national authorities (Ministries of Interior, Ministries of Justice, Migration agencies) who use Asylum data to monitor or project the development of their national asylum procedures
• the European Migration Network (EMN) which uses the Asylum data as a basis for its annual EU- and national-level statistical and analytical reports
• researchers and students conducting analysis and research in the field of asylum
• journalists and international organisations in the area of asylum and migration

Certain statistical needs related to asylum are not met fully by the statistics collected under the Regulation. For example, statistics on First time asylum applicants (as opposed to Total Asylum applicants) are only covered by "Gentlemen's agreements" with national data suppliers. Nevertheless, despite its voluntary nature, the coverage of this indicator is almost complete, with 27 out of the 28 EU Member States and 3 out of the 4 EFTA countries reporting it to Eurostat.

Eurostat does not conduct user satisfaction surveys per se. Instead the users satisfaction is monitored on a constant way through informal and formal contacts and communications with users and through requests and comments received by users.

The completeness of the Asylum data depends largely on the availability of the data from the relevant data providers (National Statistical Institutes, Interior ministries or migration related agencies). Generally, all Member States and EFTA countries are producing the complete asylum applications data. Occassionally the completeness of the data may vary due to various constraints in the data providers administrative systems.

See annexes.

The accuracy of statistical outputs in the general statistical sense is the degree of closeness of estimates to the true values.

The overall assesment of the accuracy of the Asylum data collection is considered to be high.

The Asylum data are collected mainly through national administrative sources (registers in Ministries of Interior or related Immigration Agencies). It follows that accuracy of the Asylum data depends largely on the accuracy and efficiency of the underlying administrative systems of the national data providers.

Main sources of errors are:

• differences in definitions by not recording a certain information, which may thus lead to over- or undercoverage of the target population, or
• errors in the administrative register system (less often, mainly of technical nature)

Certain such discrepancies have occured over the years impacting some times on the accuracy (and comparability) of the asylum data (please see annex on 2009 Metadata questionnaire summary for country specific issues).

Many Member States have lately introduced more integrated and comprehensive administrative systems that make use of modern IT and communication methods. Moreover, more sophisticated systems (e.g. EURODAC database) also reduce the risk of over-counting, such as by helping to identify where a person has already made an asylum application (and so should therefore not be counted again as a first time asylum applicant).

Not applicable.

Not applicable.

Depending on data periodicity data are sent to Eurostat by the reporting countries:

• Quarterly data: not later than 2 months after the end of the reference period
• Yearly data: not later than 3 months after the end of the reference period 

Generally, data are released by Eurostat on the public online database approximately 3 working days immediately after their reception (given that they do not contain any errors). In exceptional cases (large revisions, further validation, technical reasons, etc.) data may be disseminated later than 3 working days.

The punctuality of the data is overall very good.

Almost all countries are able to meet the requirements of transmitting the data within the deadlines foreseen in the Regulation.

However, it is often the case that few countries might transmit the data some days/weeks after the deadlilne. Such delays will impact as well the scheduled timetable of certain publications, like the quarterly Data in Focus publication or the annual News Releases. The number of countries which provide delayed data can vary from period to period depending on problems that may arise in the respective national administrative systems.

Every effort is made to collect comparable data.

Main concepts and definitions are followed by the Meber States. However, there is a number of differences in concepts, definitions or data sources used in different countries which can make comparisons between countries difficult and occasionally misleading.

Explanatory notes by countries are provided in the annexes at the bottom of this page.

There are two specific reference periods that should be taken into account when analysing/comparing Asylum data over time:

The first one is January 2008. Prior to January 2008, Asylum statistics were collected on the basis of a Gentlemen's agreement. Concepts used by countries prior 2008 and after the entry into force of the Regulation (EC) 862/2007 (January 2008 and on) may thus differ. Therefore comparisons of prior-2008 and after-2008 Asylum data should be exercised with caution.

Data after January 2008, when Regulation (EC) 862/2007 entered into force, are considered to be highly comparable over time. However, various improvements or changes in the national administrative systems and statistical methodology may sometimes cause breaks in the time series. Please consult the explanatory notes by countries provided in the Annexes at the bottom of this page.

The second important reference period one needs to take into account when comparing Asylum data over time is January 2014. In December 2013 the Technical Guidelines were reviewed by Eurostat jointly with DG HOME, EASO and FRONTEX, to ensure the maximum harmonisation of the asylum data collection methodology and to reflect the recent recast of the legislation in the area of asylum.

These new 2013 guidelines first enter into force for data of reference period of:

• January 2014 onwards, for monthly data
• first quarter 2014 onwards, for quarterly data
• 2014 year onwards, for annual data

The new 2013 guidelines may imply a methodological break in series for Asylum data before and after January 2014. To further identify the real impact of the new 2013 Asylum Guidelines on the reported data and to assess whether there is a warrant for the designation of a break in series for the amended definitions, Eurostat will administer to national data providers a quality questionnaire (survey) in Autumn 2014. The results of this quality survey will be published in this metadata information accompanying the Asylum data series.

Below is a list of the concepts amended for which their assumed impact on the reporting data is potentially significant. For the full list of amendments of the new 2013 Guidelines and their implementation calendar, please see attached Annex "Implementation of the new Asylum Guidelines".

Not applicable.

Internal consistency (between time, age, sex, country, groups of citizenship) is ensured through various validation checks performed both by national data providers but also by Eurostat before data publication.

For a list of validation rules and procedures which Asylum data go through before they are considered ERROR-FREE and publishable, please see sub-concept "18.4. Data validation".

"The types of statistics required under the Regulation [862/2007] are needed also for national purposes, such
as for the management of the national system for processing asylum applications [...]. In almost all cases, the data used to produce the statistics
are based on existing administrative and statistical systems. The specific burdens placed by the Regulation on national authorities are therefore related to the need to prepare particular disaggregations or tables that might not otherwise have been produced, and to the need to apply the harmonised statistical definitions and concepts. For some national authorities, this resulted in one-off costs associated with the necessary adaptations to methods, procedures and systems.

The extent of the additional burdens varied between Member States according to the degree of similarity between the existing national systems for migration statistics and the requirements of the Regulation. However, in most Member States and for most of the statistics covered by the Regulation, the additional costs and burden are believed to be relatively limited and to be proportionate to the benefits obtained at both EU and national level of having more complete and better harmonised migration statistics." (*)

(*) Extract taken from the 2012 REPORT FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL on the implementation of Regulation (EC) No 862/2007 on Community statistics on migration and international protection.

Currently there is no specific revision policy on Asylum statistics.

However, in March 2014 Eurostat has drafted and proposed a Revision Policy for Asylum statistics in a Working Group meeting with the national data providers. This revision policy is currently under consultation with the Member States and shall be published as soon as it shall be established.

Currently, Asylum data are revised on a continuous basis according to the most recently updated data provided by the reporting countries.

Administrative data sources only.

Data are compiled from the administrative records of the national authorities, mainly the Ministries of Interior or Immigration Agencies to which asylum applicants lodge their application for international protection.

Data on first instance decisions on asylum applicants (granting, rejecting or withdrawing a protection status) are collected on a quarterly basis.

Data on final instance decisions on asylum applicants (granting, rejecting or withdrawing a protection status) and on resettled persons are collected on an annual basis.

This data collection is administered by Eurostat. The statisics are collected by the responsible data providers (National statistical Institutes, Interior Mininistries or Migration related Agencies) and are supplied to Eurostat.

A set of standardised validation checks are applied by Eurostat before publishing the data.

Currently, data providers may transmit the data either in excel, or in csv (comma separated value) templates (administered by Eurostat to Member States). or both templates validation rules are checked to ensure the internal consistency of the data:

• variable codes and values of data are from a predefined set of accepted code-lists and format
• statistics are confronted against other relevant data (e.g. a 'total' value of a given disaggregation (dimension) should equal the sum of the disaggregated data);
• investigating inconsistencies in the statistics;
• performing micro data editing;
• verifying the statistics against expectations and domain intelligence;
• outlier detection;

Aggregates on various groups of EU Member States are calculated by Eurostat on available data. EU and other aggregates are flagged 'd' when data for at least one Member States is missing.

Data have been rounded to the nearest 5.
Due to the rounding, the sum of individuals may not necessarily match the given total.

Explanatory notes are provided in the Annexes at the bottom of this page.