Scottish Government

The Scottish Government Environmental Input-Output model (EIO) is used to estimate the Green House Gas emissions associated with Scottish Government spending plans as set out in the Scottish Draft Budget.

The latest Draft Budget and associated High Level Carbon Assessment were published on September 21st 2011.

More information about the Scottish Government Environmental Input-Output model

Scottish I-O Team
September 2011

The Scottish Government Environmental Input-Output model (EIO) is used to estimate the Green House Gas emissions associated with Scottish Government spending plans as set out in the Scottish Draft Budget.

The latest Draft Budget and associated High Level Carbon Assessment were published on November 17th 2010.

More information about the Scottish Government Environmental Input-Output model

Scottish I-O Team
November 2010

Published on 13th October 2010, the latest Input-Output Tables and Multipliers for Scotland relate to 1998 to 2007. The tables are available in the downloads section of this site.

For the first time the tables include Greenhouse Gas Emission effects. These will used to estimate the emissions in the High Level Carbon Assessment of the Scottish Draft Budget 2011/2012, currently scheduled for November 2010. Please see GHG estimation methodology for more information.

Methodological changes

Overall, this set of tables uses the same methodology as the 1998-2004 tables published in March 2009. The main methodological changes are:

Regional Accounts constraining

The 126 industry GVA estimates published in the Use tables have been constrained to ONS Regional Accounts for a number of years. Since Regional Accounts are at the 31 Industry level, the Input-Output categories always summed to the individual Regional Accounts category totals.

In the past, the smoothed, headline Regional Accounts estimates have been used. After discussion within the Input-Output Expert Users Group the decision has been taken to switch over to using the raw GVA estimates. Since there is increasing use of the Supply-Use Tables within the Scottish National Accounts Project, on advice from ONS National Accounts and the Input-Output Expert Users Group, it makes more sense to use the actual raw estimates rather than artificially smoothed estimates. The raw estimates represent actual changes from year to year. The smoothed estimates are required by Eurostat as a measure of longer term changes in trend, and therefore do not reflect actual changes from one year to the next.

The GVA figures contained in the latest IO tables are broadly equivalent (unless explicitly adjusted; see table below) to the raw Regional Accounts figures published by the Office for National Statistics. However, the actual source used is the GDP(i) estimates produced as part of the Scottish National Accounts Project (SNAP) which also take into account any recent changes to total UK GVA since the last publication of the Regional Accounts, in practice for the period covered by the latest IO release, the difference is marginal, for 2007 the adjusted GVA figure only diverges from the published Regional Accounts total by £0.45 million.

Over the past few years there have been several industries where we have felt Scottish GVA estimates taken from the Annual Business Inquiry were more accurate than Regional Accounts top down Scottish employment share of UK estimates. Although expert users recognise the advantages of having a fully UK Regional Accounts constrained set of Scottish Supply-Use Tables, it was agreed by the expert users group that, where other data sources suggest otherwise, it would be preferable for the Scottish estimates to depart from this constraint.

As a result, there has been close working with the Scottish National Accounts Project (SNAP) and GDP(O) Short Term Indicators teams over a number of months to enforce consistency between each source to allow triangulation between Regional Accounts and alternative estimates. Constraining to Regional Accounts raw estimates has been the initial and default position, only breaking away from Regional Accounts estimates where it was felt necessary due to access to better data and where differences could be explained with reference to the Regional Accounts methodologies.

Difference between ONS Regional Accounts raw GVA estimates and published Scottish Use table values
Published SUT estimate minus Regional Accounts raw estimates (£m)
note - only showing Regional Accounts categories where changes have been made

DF: Manufacture of Coke, Refined Petroleum Products and Nuclear Fuel
DG: Manufacture of Chemicals, Chemical products and Man-Made Fibres
Data obtained directly from producers suggests principle product classification issues within Regional Accounts estimates

In the past, during the process of moving initial GVA estimates either up or down to constrain to published Regional Accounts figures, overall industry output was not changed. Instead, Intermediate Consumption was adjusted to retain the initial output estimate with a resulting change in the overall industry production function. This has been discussed and recognised as not ideal by the Expert Users Group. On advice from ONS representation on that group the Scottish tables now retain the initial GVA to Output ratio so that industry output will increase or decrease in line with the GVA changes, thus retaining the initial production function, as obtained from the Annual Business Inquiry. This is an important improvement which should provide better quality industry linkage estimates and therefore improved economic impact assessments that utilise the Input-Output analytical tables and multipliers.

Since output can now change during GVA constraining, industry level Output at basic Prices in the Supply table must also change to the same estimate. This has resulted in shifts of domestic output and trade to the rest of the UK and rest of the World when compared to previously published figures.

Agriculture

Note that the Single Farm Subsidy came into effect in January 2005 increasing the figure within the taxes less subsidies row of the Use matrix from 2005 onwards. This change is also noticeable in the UK Use table.

Household and Tourist Demand

Scottish National Accounts Project data are now being used for Household and Tourist expenditure totals. This is based on quarterly estimates, summed to calendar year, for household expenditures consistent with the UK consumer trends. The new methodology is consistent with other estimates used in the Government Expenditure Revenue Scotland (GERS) exercise.

Scottish I-O Team
October 2010

The next set of Input-Output Tables and Multipliers for Scotland will be available to download from Wednesday October 13th 2010.

Our original plan to produce 2004-2007 tables is changed in favour of producing a full set of 1998-2007 tables to ensure a long run consistent time series of tables back to 1998 to allow formal benchmarking of the data underpinning the quarterly GDP(O) index in constant prices. This also supports the production of a number of new statistical products resulting from the Scottish National Accounts Project.

Alongside the usual output, income, employment and GVA multiplier and effects tables, we shall also publish a set of Greenhouse Gas Emission effects. These will be used to estimate the emissions in the High Level Carbon Assessment of the Scottish Draft Budget 2011/2012, currently scheduled for November 2010.

The GHG emission effects will be based upon the 2007 IO tables and will be in 2011/12 prices. Please see the 2010/11 Carbon Assessment for more information.

Scottish I-O Team
September 2010

The Scottish Budget Draft Budget 2010/11 was published on September 17th.

The Draft Budget itself can be found here:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2009/09/17093831/0

The accompanying High Level Carbon Assessment document can be found here:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/budgetcarbonassessment

Scottish I-O Team
September 2009

In 2008 the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth made a commitment to publish estimates of the Green House Gas emissions associated with the planned government spending as detailed in the Scottish Government Draft Budget, scheduled to be published in September 2009.

The commitment by the Cabinet Secretary is an ambitious one. A range of experts acknowledged in evidence to the Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change Committee that the carbon assessment of spend is a complex process and that there is no single recognised estimation methodology. Recognising the challenging nature of the task, the Scottish Government convened an expert workshop at the end of November 2008 to discuss the merits and limitations of different methodologies, and identify the most appropriate way forward. Having considered a number of possibilities, Environmental Input-Output (EIO) analysis was identified by the contractors as providing the best option to provide a high level assessment of the impact of Government spending on emissions.

The Office of the Chief Economic Adviser has been working with economists and researchers in the Scottish Government Rural and Environment Analytical Services to extend the current IO model to include GHG emission intensities from ONS Environmental Accounts. We have also been working with Scottish Government Finance colleagues to map individual draft budget spend lines on to the industrial classification required for the EIO analyses.

The plan is to publish the modelled analyses alongside the Scottish Budget within a separate High Level Carbon Assessment document. The very clear message will be that these are initial estimates of GHG emissions. In this context, it is important to see the assessment this September as a developing approach (without precedent in government accounting), with further work required over time to develop the accuracy and functionality of assessment techniques.

This will be important because, from 2010, there will be a statutory requirement for the Scottish Government to publish GHG emissions estimates along side their spending plans. The intention, in the longer term is to work towards developing the methodology and to agree a publication strategy that would sit within the pre-announcement and pre-release access required of Official Statistics.

A link to the Draft Budget and the accompanying High Level Carbon Assessment document will be placed here once they are published in September.

Scottish I-O Team
August 2009

The Scottish Input-Output Tables, Supply and Use Tables and associated analyses rely heavily on the UK Supply and Use Tables. As a result of the UK National Accounts re-engineering programme it was not possible to construct 2005 and 2006 Scottish Supply and Use Tables. This was discussed in the Input-Output Expert Users Group (IOEUG) and agreed that Scotland should use 2008 to develop time series consistent Supply and Use tables and associated analytical tables. This work was completed and published in March 2009. For more information about the Scottish Supply and Use table publications plans and decisions for 2008 please see papers and minutes from the IOEUG May 2007 meeting.

Since publication of the 1998-2004 tables, we have been working with ONS colleagues to obtain sufficient UK Supply and Use Table data to allow construction of more up to date tables. ONS published the UK 2004-2007 Supply and Use tables at the end of July 2009 and the agreements are now in place to begin to receive the data required to produce the Scottish tables.

The Scottish IO team are now beginning to construct the raw 2004-2007 tables and plan to publish these in 2010. It is not possible at the moment to be more specific about when the new tables will be ready for publication; high levels of work on developing the new High Level Carbon Assessment of Government Spending, staff changes and the system changes required to deal with the new, post re-engineered ONS National Accounts System Supply and Use Table data are all playing a part. For more information please see the papers and minutes from the IOEUG May 2009 meeting.

Updates will be posted here when available.

Scottish I-O Team
August 2009

Published on 31st March 2009, the latest tables relate to 1998 to 2004. These are the first Scottish time series consistent tables and replace previously published tables for these years, which were published as annual snapshots. The tables are available in the downloads section of this site.

Overall, this set of tables uses the same methodology as the original 2004 tables, which were published in December 2007. The main methodological changes are:

Finance Sector

Some of the industries relating to financial intermediation have been merged, namely '100.1 - Banking' and '100.2 - Other Financial Institutions' were merged to be just 100, and '102.1 - Auxiliary Financial Services nec' and '102.2 - Auxiliary to Insurance' were merged to be just 102.

The reason for merging these is that, for IOCs 100.1 and 100.2, there is no longer any real difference in the activities these industries carry out - the activities of building societies are largely indistinguishable from banks, and for IOCs 102.1 and 102.2 there is no up-to-date reliable data source available to allow us to update these figures.

Financial Intermediation Services Indirectly Measured (FISIM)

According to the European System of Accounts 1995 (ESA95) there are 2 methods of allocating FISIM in the Input-Output tables. The simplest way, which we have used in previous years, is to treat FISIM as a nominal industry with negative GVA. The second option is to quantify the value of FISIM 'supplied' to each of the intermediate and final demand sectors. Since the UK I-O tables have now adopted the second, more complicated, method we now have the necessary data to allow the Scottish I-O tables to be produced in the same way.

For more information on FISIM and the revised methodology please these papers from the SESCG meeting:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Economy/ScotStat/Oct08Paper3

and the article in SES 2008:

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2009/01/29150444/7

Scottish I-O Team
March 2009

The Scottish Input-Output Tables, Supply and Use Tables and associated analyses rely heavily on the UK Supply and Use Tables and are constrained to the Regional Accounts based estimates of Gross Value Added ( GVA) at the 31 industry level (and financial intermediation services indirectly measured).

The UK National Accounts systems and methods are undergoing a major overhaul as part of the Office for National Statistics statistical modernisation programme. The National Accounts re-engineering programme is aiming to deliver quarterly and annual Supply and Use Tables in both current prices and previous years' prices going back to 1997. To facilitate this process, the Input-Output Analytical Tables produced by the ONS were suspended in 2003, and the ONS 2007 annual Blue Book exercise did not include the production of the 2005 Supply and Use Tables, revisions to earlier Supply and Use Tables, annual benchmarking of quarterly sources onto annual survey results, amongst various other stored revisions including the allocation of financial intermediation services indirectly measured. This in turn affects the Regional Accounts as the UK control totals by industry, by sector and by type of income are generated through the production of the Supply and Use Tables process.

As a result, there will be no UK Supply and Use Tables, Input-Output publication or associated analyses until around September 2008. More details of the modernisation work can be found in this article on the ONS web site.

These changes also affect the publication of ONS Regional Accounts estimates of GVA at the industry level such that in the 2007 December publication, the industrial detail will not be published.

As a result of these changes, publication of the 2005 Scottish Input-Output Tables, scheduled for December 2008, will also be delayed.

After consultation with the Input-Output Expert Users Group, it was agreed that ONS re-engineering provided the opportunity to work on the planned development of consistent times series Input-Output Tables for Scotland. The group was consulted on a range of options and it was agreed we would begin the development of a full set of 1998-2004 tables as soon as the 2004 tables were published. Please see the May 2007 meeting on the Expert Users Group web site (part of SCOTSTAT) for further information about this decision: www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/scotstat/economy/groups .

Scottish I-O Team
December 2007