Handbook on Extended Supply and Use Tables and Extended Input-Output Tables

This Handbook is a significant step towards bridging the gap between macroeconomic (national accounts) and microeconomic data (business statistics and trade statistics, at enterprise level or by type of enterprise). It provides methodological guidance to combine the strengths of each. The macroeconomic statistics relate to gross domestic product (GDP) and employment, and they are internally consistent. They are also complete, containing estimates of production that is difficult to survey, such as some activities of microenterprises and illegal activities. The microeconomic statistics provide a wealth of detail on many types of enterprises that interest policy makers, including small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), multinationals, and exporters/non-exporters. The Handbook is the result of the work of the OECD Expert Group on Extended Supply and Use Tables (EGESUT), which was launched in 2014.

Combining macroeconomic and microeconomic statistics has many benefits. It relates production, value added, imports and exports by type of enterprise to GDP, total employment and other macroeconomic data in a consistent way. It adds heterogeneity to statistics and indicators such as the domestic value-added content of exports. This is desirable, since the aggregate might mask important information related to the diversity of the components. It also provides new indicators about direct and indirect linkages, of types of enterprises with each other, and of types of enterprises with foreign and domestic supply and use. For example, it is well-known that SMEs generally have a lower propensity to export than large enterprises. The new information shows that due to their sizeable indirect exports, supplying large exporters with goods and services, SMEs still benefit from foreign markets. Furthermore, compiling extended supply and use tables (ESUTs) will improve the current statistical system since it integrates data at a more detailed level, which makes it easier to relate imbalances in supply and use to their source and to resolve them.

The conceptual measurement framework to combine the information consists of compiling ESUTs and extended input-output tables (EIOTs). This is fully consistent with the fundamental measurement framework of the System of National Accounts (SNA). The ESUT approach is mentioned in the 2025 SNA and fully adheres to its principles. Taking as its starting point the regular supply and use tables (SUTs) and input-output tables (IOTs) in the SNA, the ESUT and EIOT introduce an extra dimension for measuring the economy: the type of enterprise. This leads to additional rows and columns within the ESUT and EIOT compared with the regular SUT. Instead of metal manufacturing, one could have metal manufacturing SMEs and metal manufacturing large enterprises. Separating enterprises into different types provides important perspectives on the amount of output, value added, compensation of employees and employment by enterprise type. Enterprises could be classified as a certain type depending on, for example, the size of the enterprise, foreign/domestic ownership or trading status (e.g. exporter and non-exporter).

In 2014, the OECD launched the EGESUT. Country experts and representatives from international organisations have met several times over the past decade to discuss various conceptual and methodological issues and to share best practices. This led to a series of recommendations that have no or minimal impact on data collection and are broadly replicable across countries. The non-prescriptive nature of the ESUT framework (where estimates can be published if the data are available, but compilers can choose not to publish results for which they lack data or have quality concerns) will help countries to make progress and publish results, even if they are “experimental”. The Handbook contains the combined knowledge and experience of the EGESUT members. It has been put into practice in several countries over the last decade (Belgium, Costa Rica, Finland, Italy, Japan, Mexico and the Netherlands, among others).

The Handbook sets out the concepts, methodologies and data sources necessary to compile ESUTs and EIOTs. It provides a thorough step-by step explanation of how the methodologies work. It includes various examples and guidance on how to deal with specific conceptual and practical issues in the compilation process. It also builds on international and national experiences as well as on best practices to expand compilation guidance. The discussion covers examples of data sources used by compilers to produce the estimates and the specific challenges they encountered. The Handbook’s recommendation is, to the extent possible, to build on and combine existing data sources.

Besides providing guidance for the ideal data situation, when all enterprise data are available, the Handbook also indicates what can be done in other situations, when fewer or no enterprise data are available. The latter is typically the case for researchers outside a national statistical office. The Handbook explains how to balance the ESUTs and how to transform them into EIOTs. Since there is much policy interest for the integration of different enterprise types into the global value chain, it explains how to embed an EIOT into a multi-country input-output table (MCIOT, see the United Nations Handbook on Supply and Use Tables and Input-Output Tables with Extensions and Applications). An MCIOT allows mapping the whole global value chain, with all industries and countries involved. After the embedding, one can analyse on which countries a particular enterprise type is dependent for direct and indirect imports and exports. The Handbook ends with a chapter on dissemination and a chapter that relates ESUTs and EIOTs to other dimensions, such as productivity, the environment or employment.

Although the main examples illustrate industry breakdowns by enterprise size, ownership or trading status, the methods are applicable in other situations as well. For example, in emerging economies, a breakdown into formal and informal components of the economy might be more relevant. In addition, as the domain is still evolving and some details of compilation practices are not yet well established, the authors of the Handbook recognise that co-ordinated international effort is still required to address the remaining practical and conceptual challenges.

That said, the ESUTs and EIOTs have been compiled assuming the regular SUTs and IOTs exist. Strategically, in developing the regular SUTs and IOTs, the ESUTs and EIOTs could be at the core of the process from the business register through business surveys and then onto national accounts. In this situation, the regular SUTs would be formed by simply aggregating the ESUTs.