Product description: Statistics on the transit road traffic via Finland to the eastern border (2006)

Purpose

Information on the quantity and value of the eastward transit road traffic is needed e.g. for traffic planning, as well as for the direction and control of goods flows. Before the year 2002, information has been available only at the level of very roughly classified groups of goods. Information on value was totally lacking.

Compilation of the data

The data for statistics on the transit traffic is collected at the customs offices at the eastern border at the stage when they are handling the transit documents. For every transit transport, the customs offices in Imatra, Niirala, Nuijamaa and Vaalimaa are registering the identity of the consignment and the vechicle, the quantity in kilograms, the CN-code for every group of goods at the level of four-digit product code, as well as data on the transit customs office and on the country of destination. For household type equipment and cars the number of items is registered, whenever possible. If a consignment contains goods belonging to several CN4-groups, but if at least 75 percent of the weight of the consignment belongs to just one CN4-group, the consignment will be registered under that group of goods. However, the additional, a "75 percent-notification" has to be registered to clarify that the consignment is not homogeneous. If the content of the consignment is so heterogeneous that the consignment can not be registered under any product group even under the above mentioned principle of preponderance, it is registered under the group "unspecified" with the CN-code 9969.

Every month, the customs offices are sending the data in electronic form to the Statistics Unit at the Board of Customs, which on the basis of the data compiles the Transit Trade Statistics.

Concepts, definitions and classifications used

The transit statistics are published using the EU classification of Products by Activity CPA (Council Regulations, EEC, No 3969/93 issued 29.10.1993). The goods are divided into 31 groups and, in addition, into a group of unspecified goods. The grouping is based either on the Russian statistics on import in these groups from the western countries, being comparably large, or on the Russian statistics on import from Finland, being clearly larger than what appears in the Finnish export statistics to Russia, because these differences are often due to the fact that the Russian statistics show the transit import via Finland as import from Finland.

The CPA groupings used in the statistics, and the key between CPA groupings and the CN-nomenclature are presented as an attachment to the transit survey.

Because the material on transit lacks value information, the value of the groups of goods has been given on the basis of estimation. The estimation is based on one hand on the export prices of the countries which play a significant role in the Russian imports and on the other hand on the four-digit unit values in the CN-classification based on the Finnish export to Russia. The estimate for the unit value of every CPA-group is the weighted average of the unit values of the groups belonging to the CN-commodity groups. The unit value of the "unspecified" group is the weighted avarage of the unit values in the other nineteen groups.

Because the internal structure of the groups of goods, as well as the price level can change rapidly, the weights and unit prices of the different items are calculated again every second or third year using always the latest available statistics. Changes of the groups of goods in the statistics on the transit traffic can also be made, if there are significant structural changes of goods in the transit transports.

Reliability of the statistics and sources of error

When the data are tested, it is for instance verified that the quantity and the CN-code are given for every transit consignment, and that not a single consignment exceeds the weight of 60 000 kilograms. The main possibility of error is connected to the calculation of the value of the transit transports, because no such comparative data exist with which one could accurately define the unit value of goods in transit.

Information content and the publication timeframe

The transit statistics contain the transit export quantities in tons and the values in thousands of euros by different groups of goods and by customs offices. The statistics are published quarterly within six weeks from the end of the quarter concerned.

Additional information about the statistics is available from the Finnish Board of Customs. The contact address is given on the back page of the survey and on the Board of Customs' internet pages (www.tulli.fi).



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