New economic activity returns to be voluntary at first

Wednesday 28 April 2021

The States are looking at new ways to improve GDP and GVA estimates using businesses' year-end accounts.

Government is piloting a new economic activity return that will be voluntary at first and is already backed by law should the States decide to make it mandatory in the future.

For now, businesses and traders are 'encouraged' to submit a return with their year-end figures for 2020 so that they can be figured into GDP and GVA estimates. These are used to determine the value generated by each sector of Guernsey’s economy, identifying industry trends.

Head of Data and Analysis Helen Walton said the information is vital, not only because it informs the States on how to target its resources, but in guiding how much money should be invested into public infrastructure or donated to overseas aid in line with fixed targets linked to GDP.

"We want to be sure our first estimates of GVA and GDP for 2020 accurately reflect the impacts that the coronavirus pandemic had on our economy and to do so, we need some more data," said Ms Walton.

"The data needed, includes turnover and costs, which we hope can easily be sourced from year-end accounts. The data you supply will be strictly confidential to officers in the Data & Analysis Service and will only be used to produce economic statistics.

"If this pilot is well supported, it will, when combined with our normal data sources, give us enough data to estimate 2020 GVA and GDP with high confidence."