Statistics Estonia

Economic and Environmental Statistics Department

Tatari 51, 10134, Tallinn

Narva mnt. 20, 51009, Tartu

Mandatory data collection at EU level is based on legal act, the Regulation EU 2018/643 and covers goods and passengers.
Data is collected as follows:

• Annex I (Annex A, annual data) – goods transport ,
• Annex II (Annex C, annual data) – passenger transport,
• Annex III (Annex E, quarterly data) - goods and passengers,
• Annex IV and V (Annexes F and G, data every five years) regional statistics on goods and passengers on rail network segments and
• Annex VIII (annual data) goods and passengers transport for small undertakings - not provided separately, as the data are provided in annexes I and II.

Goods transported by rail are classified according to the 20 divisions of goods following the 'Standard Goods Classification for Transport Statistics 2007’ with effect from reference year 2008.

Estonia does not collect data at the NUTS 2 level. There is very minimal goods transport with EU countries. There is currently no international passenger rail transport. Estonia is classified as a single NUTS2 area. 

For countries International Standard Codes for the Representation of the Names of Countries (ISO 3166) is used.

CLASSIFICATION OF DANGEROUS GOODS
These categories are those defined in the regulations concerning the international carriage of dangerous goods by rail, usually known as the RID, agreed upon by the OTIF.

(as adopted under Directive 2008/68/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (1).)

Rail transport: Railway undertakings of reporting country providing transport of passengers or goods in the national territory.

The main concepts used in rail domain are according to the Glossary for transport statistics:

Rail passenger means any person, excluding members of the train crew, who makes a trip by rail. For accident statistics, passengers trying to embark/disembark onto/from a moving train are included.
Passenger-km means the unit of measure representing the transport of one passenger by rail over a distance of one kilometer. Only the distance on the national territory of the reporting country shall be taken into account.
Weight means the quantity of goods in tonnes (1 000 kilograms). The weight to be taken into consideration includes, in addition to the weight of the goods transported, the weight of packaging and the tare weight of containers, swap bodies, pallets as well as road vehicles transported by rail in the course of combined transport operations. If the goods are transported using the services of more than one railway undertaking, when possible the weight of goods shall not be counted more than once.
Tonne-km means the unit of measure of goods transport which represents the transport of one tonne (1 000 kilograms) of goods by rail over a distance of one kilometer. Only the distance on the national territory of the reporting country shall be taken into account.
Train means one or more railway vehicles hauled by one or more locomotives or railcars, or one railcar travelling alone, running under a given number or specific designation from an initial fixed point to a terminal fixed point. A light engine, that is to say, a locomotive travelling on its own, is not considered to be a train.
Train-km means the unit of measure representing the movement of a train over one kilometre. The distance used is the distance actually run, if available, otherwise the standard network distance between the origin and destination shall be used. Only the distance on the national territory of the reporting country shall be taken into account.

Statistical units for rail transport statistics are railway undertakings of reporting country providing transport of passengers or goods.

Data on passenger and freight transport are collected from the railway undertakings operating at national territory within thresholds mentioned in the rail regulation.
Data on traffic are collected from railway undertakings.

(Operational railway network on the Estonian national territory.)

Estonian rail companies only have 1520 mm gauge rolling stock and are thus restricted to countries that share this gauge.

Data on passengers and goods are covered from 2004 onwards.

Not applicable.

The volume and performance of rail freight traffic are measured in tonnes (mass) and tonne-kilometres. Passenger transport by rail is measured in the number of passengers and in passenger-kilometres (in thousands). Information on the number of train kilometres is also available.
Traffic flows on the rail network are measured in number of trains - passenger and freight.

The tables consist mostly of annual data. There are some tables providing quarterly and quinquennial (every five years) data.

According to the Rail regulation (EU) 2018/643 data is collected as following: Annual data
– Annex I (Annex A) – goods transport collected for a reference period of one year with a deadline for data transmission as 5 months after the reference period,
– Annex II (Annex C) – passenger transport, yearly data with 8 months deadline after the end of reference period
– Annex III (Annex E) – quarterly data for goods and passengers with a deadline of 3 months after the end of the reference period,
– Annex IV and V (Annexes F and G) data every five years on regional statistics on goods and passengers and rail network with deadline of 12 respectively 18 months after the end of reference period and
– Annex VIII goods and passengers transport for small undertakings with 5 respectively 8 months deadline after the end of reference period.

Annex VIII is not used, because it is set only for undertakings with a total volume of freight transport of less than 200 million tonne-km and less than 500 000 tonnes and not reporting under Annex I (detailed reporting) and only for undertakings with a total volume of passenger transport of less than 100 million passenger-km not reporting under Annex II (detailed reporting). All such data are reported under Annex I and II.

National Level:

• Official Statistics Act. Passed 10.06.2010. RT I 2010, 41, 241. Entry into force 01.08.2010 (https://www.riigiteataja.ee/en/eli/ee/517122019002/consolide/current)

European Level:

REGULATION (EU) 2018/643 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 18 April 2018 on rail transport statistics (recast) https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2018/643/oj

None in place.

National level:

•  Official Statistics Act. Passed 10.06.2010. RT I 2010, 41, 241. Entry into force 01.08.2010. The dissemination of data collected for the purpose of producing official statistics is guided by the requirements provided for in § 32, § 34, § 35, § 38 of the Official Statistics Act. (https://www.riigiteataja.ee/en/eli/ee/506012015002/consolide/current)

European level:

• 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.

The data provided to Eurostat in the data sets contain some confidential information. It is flagged as such in accordance with the requirements.

The treatment of confidential data is regulated by the Procedure for Protection of Data Collected and Processed by Statistics Estonia: https://www.stat.ee/en/statistics-estonia/data-protection-privacy-policy.

Notifications about the dissemination of statistics on all topics are published in the release calendar, which is available on the website. Every year on October 1st, the release times of the statistical database, news releases, main indicators by IMF SDDS and publications for the following year are announced in the release calendar (in the case of publications – the release month). Irregular reports are published in addition to the data in the database.

https://www.stat.ee/en/calendar

All users have been granted equal access to official statistics: dissemination dates of official statistics are announced in advance and no user category (incl. Eurostat, state authorities and mass media) is provided access to official statistics before other users. Official statistics are first published in the statistical database. Official statistics are available on the website at 8:00 a.m. on the date announced in the release calendar.

No news releases are published. News articles may be published after the publication of the data in the public database.

The annual and quarterly statistics required by Eurostat are published with the same frequency in the national database. The quinquennial statistics are published annually.

Simple monthly statistics on transport within Estonian borders are also published according to the needs of domestic and other international organizations.
This includes:
Goods transported, 1000 t
Goods transported, 1000 t*km
Passengers transported, 1000
Passengers transported, 1000 passenger-km
The goods data are disaggregated by public and private railroads.

No news releases are published. 

News articles may be published after the publication of the data in the public database.

Data are published under the subject area “Economy / Transport” in the statistical database at https://andmed.stat.ee/en/stat .

Not practiced.

Data serve as input for the statistical activity “Transport of passengers and goods by transport enterprises”, also conducted by Statistics Estonia.

Dedicated Meta information (Definitions, comments, methods, quality) on Rail Transport Statistics is available at national level: https://www.stat.ee/en/find-statistics/methodology-and-quality/esms-metadata/22015.

Dedicated Meta information (Definitions, comments, methods, quality) on Rail Transport Statistics is available at national level:  https://www.stat.ee/en/find-statistics/methodology-and-quality/esms-metadata/22015.

To assure the quality of processes and products, Statistics Estonia applies the EFQM Excellence Model, the European Statistics Code of Practice and the Quality Assurance Framework of the European Statistical System (ESS QAF). Statistics Estonia is also guided by the requirements in § 7. “Principles and quality criteria of producing official statistics” of the Official Statistics Act.

Statistics Estonia performs all statistical activities according to an international model (Generic Statistical Business Process Model – GSBPM). According to the GSBPM, the final phase of statistical activities is overall evaluation using information gathered in each phase or sub-process; this information can take many forms, including feedback from users, process metadata, system metrics and suggestions from employees. This information is used to prepare the evaluation report, which outlines all the quality problems related to the specific statistical activity and serves as input for improvement actions.

Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications; Ministry of Finance; Technical Regulatory Authority

We regularly collect feedback from users about the kind of information the society needs. The main users of statistics are public authorities, industry associations, research and educational institutions and local government associations.

Since 1996 the Statistical Office conducts reputation surveys and user surveys. The survey is conducted at least once a year, the existing as well as potential consumers are interviewed. https://www.stat.ee/en/statistics-estonia/about-us/user-surveys

The survey is generic and does not address rail, transport or economic statistics separately from the general outlooks on the Statistical Office's works.

In compliance with the rules (regulations). No particular deviancies.

The type of survey and the data collection methods ensure good coverage and timeliness. All companies registered in Estonia that are active in rail transport report data monthly, quarterly and annually. The processing with several checks as well as checks done before transmitting data to Eurostat provides a sufficient accuracy of the data.

Not applicable for rail transport data collection, since total population sampling is used.

We take all measures necessary to ensure the quality of the data transmitted.

The total freight in tonnes may be double counted because in domestic transport one and the same quantity of freight may be carried to the destination by several railway enterprises if one of them carries the freight on a public railway and the other carrier on a non-public railway. 

Data are disseminated in national statistical database 65 days after the reporting quarter (T + 65) and 130 days after the end of the accounting year (T + 130).

Quarterly data are transmitted to Eurostat within three months after end of reference period; annual data within five or eight months after end of reference period as it is according to REGULATION (EU) 2018/643 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 18 April 2018 on rail transport statistics (recast). 

Quarterly data are transmitted to Eurostat within three months after end of reference period; annual data within five or eight months after end of reference period as it is according to REGULATION (EU) 2018/643 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 18 April 2018 on rail transport statistics (recast). 

Great majority of the data deliveries have been punctual. Unfortunately no more accurate punctuality estimate is available at this time.

The data are comparable to data of other European Union countries because the common methodology has been used for rail transport statistics. Eurostat mirror checks are trusted to show any discrepancies, insofar as they are able. It must be considered that of Estonia's goods rail traffic, most of the international trade has been with non-EU countries as the partners.  Estonia currently has no international passenger rail traffic.

The data are comparable over time because common methodology has been used.

The detailed information on eventual breaks in the time series is provided in the Country Specific Notes (CSNs) available at Eurostat’s metadata page (in Annex part).

Comparisons with other transport statistics are only partially and to a limited extent possible with regard to freight transport and passenger transport, since data are currently not available or are not collected at the same level of detail and also different methods and underlying objectives.

The data are made internally coherent by using common methodology in data collection and the same rules of data aggregation.

Cost of statistical activity 28 thousand euros.

Total time of filling in reports of the statistical activity, working days (2022): 

• Annual questionnaire 2.3
• Quarterly questionnaire 3.0
• Monthly questionnaire 6.4

Average time of filling in the reports, hours per report (2022):

• Annual questionnaire 2.0
• Quarterly questionnaire 0.6
• Monthly questionnaire 0.4

The data revision policy and notification of corrections are described in the dissemination policy of Statistics Estonia at Official Statistics Act https://www.riigiteataja.ee/en/eli/ee/506012015002/consolide/current .

The published data may be revised if the methodology is modified, errors are discovered, new or better data become available. 

The population of the survey includes all companies whose economic activity includes the transport of passengers or goods by rail and who have been issued the corresponding operating licenses. Smpling design method - expert. The population includes 10 objects. All objects are observed.

Annual

Quarterly

Monthly

Data are collected and the submission of questionnaires is monitored through eSTAT (the web channel for electronic data submission). The questionnaires have been designed for independent completion in eSTAT and include instructions and controls. The questionnaires and information about data submission are available on Statistics Estonia’s website at https://www.stat.ee/et/esita-andmeid/andmete-esitamisest (in Estonian).

Data are collected with the monthly, quarterly and annual statistical questionnaires “Railway transport”.

Arithmetic and qualitative controls are used in the validation process, including comparison with the data of previous periods and other surveys (monthly, quarterly and annual survey).

In the case of missing or unreliable data, estimate imputation based on established regulations may be used. In 2022 this was not necessary.

Variables and statistical units which were not collected but which are necessary for producing the output are calculated. New variables are calculated by applying arithmetic conversion to already existing variables. This may be done repeatedly, the derived variable may, in turn, be based on previously derived new variables.

Micodata are aggregated to the level necessary for analysis. This includes aggregating the data according to the classification and calculating various statistical measures.

The collected data are converted into statistical output. This includes calculating additional indicators.

Not applied.

No specific comments.