National Institute of Statistics (ISTAT)

Directorate for Business Statistics (DCSE)
Division for short-term business statistics (SED)

Via Tuscolana, 1788 - 00173 Rome Italy

Classification of Types of construction (CC).

The coverage is based on the Classification of types of construction (CC) and covers Section 1 (buildings).

Italy - The whole national territory

Data are available since 2000. The questionnaires were last extensively revised in 2010. They are updated annually to improve clarity and ease of completion, and to incorporate references to new legal acts and regulations.

Not applicable - building permits data are expressed in absolute values.

Legal basis:

National level:

This is one of the mandatory surveys administered as part of the National Statistical Programme  approved with Decree of the President of the Republic, published in Ordinary Supplement No. 20 of the Official Journal - general series - no. 122 of 26 May 2022.

Presidential Decree n. 380/2001 and subsequent amendments.

European level:

Regulation (EU) of the European Parliament and of the Council No. 2019/2152 regarding European business statistics and

Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No. 2020/1197 laying down technical specifications and arrangements pursuant to Regulation (EU) 2019/2152.

Council Regulation (EC) No 1165/1998 introducing short-term statistics at European level.

Regulation (EC) of the European Parliament and of the Council No 1158/2005 amending Regulation 1165/98 and introducing the European sample schemes, industrial import prices, output prices for services and other changes.

Commission Regulation No 1503/2006 defining variables and frequency of data compilation, repealing new orders received for building construction and new orders received for civil engineering.

Commission Regulation No 472/2008 introducing the new base year 2005 and the statistical classification of economic activities, NACE Rev. 2, into short-term statistics.

No other transmissions to international organizations except Eurostat.

Survey elementary data are treated as confidential. Aggregated data are disseminated in https://www.istat.it.

Data transmitted to Eurostat encompass 11 variables, yet only 3 of them are disseminated at the national level. Starting from the provisional third quarter of 2021, all 10 variables are transmitted without confidential flags but remain embargoed until national dissemination. The new variable (the sum of square meters of useful floor area of new dwellings and square meters of new residencies for communities), sent from September 2022 (second quarter 2022 provisional), follows the same confidentiality procedures as the other 10 variables.

In December of each year, Istat publishes a release calendar, detailing the exact release dates for the upcoming year. This calendar is distributed to the press and is freely available to all interested parties.

The release calendar is disseminated on ISTAT's website: Press release calendar.

Data are also transmitted to Eurostat in according to the Release calendar for euro indicators.

Quarterly.

"Building permits indicators” is a quarterly press release with graphs and tables that ease the data analysis; a short text explains recent evolution for the phenomenon. It includes information on methodological aspects through a “Methodological note”, attached to the press release. Data series (from 2000) are disseminated in seasonally adjusted form (with quarter on previous quarter percentage changes) and in non-adjusted form (with quarter on same quarter a year ago percentage changes).

They are available on Istat's website: Building permits indicators.

Starting from the provisional third quarter of 2021, all data sent to Eurostat are embargoed and utilized for European aggregates. These data become available for national dissemination only after they have been published by ISTAT.

The overall quality assessment can be considered satisfactory, as there is a compliance between the production process and Istat quality guidelines. Indicators are relevant with regard to users' information needs, they are accurate and easily accessible and supported by metadata allowing for a perfect understanding of the data, they allows comparisons over time and respect the timing.

A set of standard quality indicators is regularly analysed and shows the following indicators: coverage and unit non-response (since 2008), editing and imputation (since 2007), timeliness and punctuality (since 2003), resources (since 2005). These indicators are available on SIQual (Information System on Quality), presented with graphs and tables for easy analysis. For more information, please refer to:  Siqual - Information System on Quality - Quick survey on building permits.

Main users of indicators of building permits are:

- Institutions: government departments, ECB, national central bank, international organisations, etc.
- Social actors: employers' organisations, trade unions, lobby groups, etc.
- Media
- Researchers & students
- Enterprises/businesses
- Internal users
- Eurostat.

Users mainly manage these data for studying evolution and planning policies at national or local level.

Not available.

Eurostat's requirements for time series data are fully met.

Quarterly estimates of construction permits, covering a comprehensive set of 11 variables, are transmitted to Eurostat 90 days following the conclusion of the reference quarter. Subsequently, these estimates undergo revision 180 days after the reference period. At the national level, a quarterly press release is issued 110 days after the reference period, featuring only 3 of the 11 variables submitted to Eurostat. Initially, the data are provisional upon the first release, with subsequent revisions leading to finalization coinciding with the dissemination of structural survey data, typically occurring around 7 months after the reference period.
The process of filling out questionnaires commences during the reference period and continues for one month afterward, marking the end of data collection.

Both European and national releases are punctual, adhering to the designated timelines for dissemination.

The data are comparable starting from the year 2000.

Comparisons with the index of production in construction reveal consistent trends, with any discrepancies typically attributable to the weight of this survey, which constitutes approximately 40% of the total data in the construction sector.

Variables V411 and V412 are coherent for common types of buildings.

The cost estimate is compiled in terms of total number of hours worked (THW). It is equal to the product of three terms: (total) Annual Working Days (AWD), (total) Hours Worked per Day (HWD), Number of Persons involved in the Survey (NPS).  

The burden estimate is compiled in terms of total number of minutes (TNM) taken to fill in the questionnaire. The respondents need about 15 minutes to fill the questionnaire, while municipalities need about 2-3 minutes to validate and send it.

 The assessment of these costs and burdens covers the statistics for both STS and national requirements.

The same indicators are compiled for these variables on quarter-on-quarter percentage changes, calculated on seasonally adjusted data, spanning from the  2018 to fourth quarter 2023.

For the analysis of these indicators, it's important to note that beginning from June 2021 (with the dissemination of provisional first quarter 2021 data), the survey transitioned into a census. Additionally, changes in the methodology concerning non-response imputation were implemented. Furthermore, starting from the fourth quarter of 2021 (provisional data), square metres of non-residential activities only pertain to new buildings. These adjustments should be taken into consideration when interpreting the data and analysing the indicators.

Monthly

Data collection is facilitated through the website https://indata.istat.it/pdc, where respondents are required to log in to access the web questionnaire. The survey utilizes two main questionnaires: the ISTAT/PDC/RE form for residential buildings and the ISTAT/PDC/NRE form for non-residential buildings.

Municipal offices are responsible for ensuring the accuracy of the reported information on a monthly basis. They fill out the relevant sections of the form and transmit the data to Istat monthly. In instances where no building permits or other qualifying titles are issued during the reference month, municipalities must submit a notice of no building activity using the ISTAT/PDC/NEG form. The deadline for municipal responses is set at 30 days after the reference month, with late submissions factored into the revision process.

To mitigate late transmissions and enhance response rates, various measures are implemented, including email reminders, deadline notices, telephone contacts, and penalties for non-responsive municipalities. Each staff member conducts periodic monitoring and follows up on non-responses through established informatics procedures. 

Data validation is applied following three type of rules:
Validation level 0: format and file structure checks;
Validation level 1: intra-dataset checks based at record and cell level;
Validation level 2: revision checks and time series checks (coherence control with previous data of the same survey).

Starting from June 2021, quarterly data will also encompass the entire population of Italian municipalities. Additionally, changes in the methodology concerning non-response imputation have been implemented.

The revision process focused on two main objectives: reducing discrepancies between the imputation method used in the structural survey and the method employed in the rapid survey and aligning imputation methods for provinces or municipalities with a population above 50,000 (large municipalities) with those for smaller municipalities, by leveraging longitudinal information derived from the municipalities themselves.

Non-response imputation methods have been simplified, utilizing longitudinal information from the same municipality whenever possible. Different imputation methods are now utilized for the residential and non-residential sectors. In cases where longitudinal information is unavailable, missing data are imputed using the mean growth rate of the stratum.In the formula below, we have y_it as the value of the observed variable for the municipality i in the month t, y_it-12 and y_it-1 are the values at time t-12 and t-1, and we have r_it-12and r_it-1equal to 1 if y_it-12 and y_it-1 are observed, otherwise they are equal to 0. If y_it is missing and at last four monthly responses are available for the period [t-12, t-1], its value will be imputated based upon the mean of observed values in this period, as follows:

For non-residential sector, extreme values are removed from the series.

If there is not enough information from a longitudinal perspective, missing data are imputed using the mean of the stratum:

Where y_jt is the observed value of the jth respondent unit at the time t and obs is the total respondents of the stratum. The strata are formed according to the demographic size class of the municipality and to geographical basis, total amount of the strata is equal to 30: five geographic divisions and six classes of population; the last population class also includes all provincial capitals.

Here in after the % composition of the strata (by number of municipalities):

-          11 North-West and population up to 3,000 inhabitants (24.8%);

-          12 North-West and population from 3,001 to 7,000 inhabitants (7.4%)

-          13 North-West and population from 7,001 to 13,000 inhabitants (3.1%);

-          14 North-West and population from 13,001 to 25,000 inhabitants (1.5%);

-          15 North-West and population from 25,001 to 49,999 inhabitants (0.6%);

-          16 North-West and population more than 49,999 inhabitants (0.4%);

-          21 North-East and population up to 3,000 inhabitants (7.5%);

-          22 North-East and population from 3,001 to 7,000 inhabitants (4.9%);

-          23 North-East and population from 7,001 to 13,000 inhabitants (2.9%);

-          24 North-East and population from 13,001 to 25,000 inhabitants (1.4%);

-          25 North-East and population from 25,001 to 49,999 inhabitants (0.5%);

-          26 North-East and population more than 49,999 inhabitants (0.3%);

-          31 Centre and population up to 3,000 inhabitants (5.8%);

-          32 Centre and population from 3,001 to 7,000 inhabitants (2.6%);

-          33 Centre and population from 7,001 to 13,000 inhabitants (1.6%);

-          34 Centre and population from 13,001 to 25,000 inhabitants (1.2%);

-          35 Centre and population from 25,001 to 49,999 inhabitants (0.5%);

-          36 Centre and population more than 49,999 inhabitants (0.4%);

-          41 South and population up to 3,000 inhabitants (13.0 %);

-          42 South and population from 3,001 to 7,000 inhabitants (4.6%);

-          43 South and population from 7,001 to 13,000 inhabitants (2.1%);

-          44 South and population from 13,001 to 25,000 inhabitants (1.5%);

-          45 South and population from 25,001 to 49,999 inhabitants (0.9%);

-          46 South and population more than 49,999 inhabitants (0.6%);

-          51 Islands and population up to 3,000 inhabitants (5.3%);

-          52 Islands and population from 3,001 to 7,000 inhabitants (2.0%);

-          53 Islands and population from 7,001 to 13,000 inhabitants (1.2%);

-          54 Islands and population from 13,001 to 25,000 inhabitants (0.5%);

-          55 Islands and population from 25,001 to 49,999 inhabitants (0.4%);

-          56 Islands and population more than 49,999 inhabitants (0.3%).

The indicators transmitted to Eurostat consist of absolute figures, without any weighting or chaining methods applied.

None