Methodology 

The Statistics and Accounts of Cultural Enterprises are summary statistics that bring together a set of economic magnitudes and indicators of enterprises whose main activity is carried out in the cultural field, allowing a more precise, reliable view of the economic dimension and yearly evolution of this sector.

The information used for these Statistics comes mainly from the statistical processing of microdata from various enterprise surveys, which Idescat carries out thanks to the conventions signed with the INE (National Statistical Institute). As for the information on foreign trade, this is drawn from data from the Department of Customs and Excise Taxes of the State Tax Administration Agency.

Results of cultural enterprises from the year 2008 are offered, the first year in which the Catalan Classification of Economic Activity 2009 was used (CCAE-2009) in structural statistics.

1. Sectorial boundary

Defining the limits of the sector is one of the basic elements of these statistics, as the diversity of activities that can be included in the concept of culture and their inter-relationship with other activities outside of the sector makes establishing clear boundaries difficult. Furthermore, with official statistics it is fundamental we guarantee comparability of results with other statistical offices, a goal that can only be met by using standardised definitions and classifications.

Nowadays, member states are the main agents in the development of cultural statistics in Europe, which means that organisation, methods and content vary greatly between countries.

The field of culture is difficult to define as it is constantly evolving. It lacks the coherence of a economic sector, in its structures, in its activities and in its products, as it includes very heterogeneous activities from various sectors of the economy. Also, the extent to which cultural statistics are developed differs greatly by country, both in terms of content, as well as methods, regularity, sector scope or sources used.

At the end of 2007, the European Union's Cultural Ministers Council identified the improvement and comparability of cultural statistics as one of the five key areas in the Work Plan for Culture 2008–2010.

At the request of Eurostat, in September 2009 a European cultural statistics working group was set up: the European Statistical System Network on Culture (ESSnet-Culture, in PDF). Financed by an agreement between the European Commission and a group of five partners co-responsible for the project (the ministries and statistical offices of Luxembourg, France, the Czech Republic, Estonia and the Netherlands), the group's mandate was to develop data generation on the basis of a coordinated statistical system and to examine the possibility of adapting or developing existing methods in order to respond to new needs and cover new domains.

In order to establish a definition of the sector for these statistics, Idescat has closely followed the methodological work carried out by the ESSnet-Culture, and has also taken into account the Framework of Cultural Statistics updated by UNESCO in 2009.

ESSnet-Culture proposes a European framework for cultural statistics based on the concept of cultural domain, which it defines as the set of practices, activities or cultural products centred around a group of expressions recognised as artistic ones.

For these Statistics, the cultural domains proposed by the ESSnet-Culture are grouped as follows:

1. Heritage, archives and libraries
2. Books and press
3. Visual arts
4. Performing arts
5. Audiovisual and multimedia
6. Architecture
7. Advertising

Following guidelines from technicians at the Ministry of Culture, who considered this definition of the cultural sector too restrictive, Idescat has added two more domains, which bring together economic activity of services and industries related to culture that, although the ESSnet-Culture considers them partially cultural, correspond to sectors that carry significant weight in the field of cultural enterprises.

The mentioned domains correspond with the Classification of Economic Activity (CCAE-2009) as follows:

(*) As of 2021, it includes class 8552.

Of the 31 CCAE-2009 classes covered by the first 7 domains in table 1, ESSnet-Culture classifies 24 as fully cultural and 7 as mainly cultural. From the year 2021 onwards, the statistics include class 8552 (Education), which is classified as fully cultural and belongs to the domain Other services related to culture. This class corresponds to the 8th cultural domain (Education) of the ESSnet-Culture classification. This inclusion has been possible due to the extension, in 2021, of the population scope analysed in the Structural Business Statistics.

The information on cultural enterprises presented here has been drawn from the following statistical sources:

• The Structural Business Statistics in the Industrial Sector and the Structural Business Statistics in the Service Sector, which offers the basic macromagnitudes for each cultural domain (value of production, intermediate consumption, value added), the number of enterprises and people employed and the main values of the operation accounts of cultural enterprises (turnover, consumption, expenditure on external services and personnel costs);
• The Statistics on R&D Activities and the Survey on Innovation in Companies, also obtained from INE, which offer basic indicators on personnel and in-house R&D expenditure and innovation of cultural enterprises, comparing them with those of all companies investigated for these two sets of statistics. These sources do not allow representative results by domain, which is why results are offered for the whole of enterprises in the cultural sector.
• The Foreign Trade statistics, created using data from the State Tax Administration Agency, which records exports, imports and the total balance of cultural goods in foreign trade, subdivided into three groupings.

The data has been classified according to the main activity of the enterprise (Structural Business Statistics in the Service Sector, Statistics on R&D Activities, Survey on Innovation in Companies) or establishment (Structural Business Statistics in the Industrial Sector). In the case of Foreign trade, cultural goods have been classified using the Combined Nomenclature (NC).

The statistical operations used and the main concepts of these operations is briefly described below.

2. Structural Business Statistics in the Industrial Sector and Structural Business Statistics in the Service Sector

The Structural Business Statistics in the Industrial Sector (called the Industrial Companies Survey prior to the reference year 2014) studies companies whose main industrial activity comes under sections B, C, D or E of the CCAE-2009. Until the year 2012, the Survey focussed its field of study on industrial companies with at least one employee. From 2013 onwards, the population scope was widened to include industrial companies without employees, and this has led to an increase in the year-over-year variability of the number of companies.

Furthermore, the Structural Business Statistics in the Service Sector (called the Annual Services Survey prior to the reference year 2014) investigates total market services; this means companies dedicated to trade, tourism, transport, IT, property and renting activity and services to businesses (sections G to J and L to N, R and S, excluding division 94). From 2021 onwards, Education and Human health and social work activities (sections P and Q of the CCAE-2009, respectively) are included.

These are two structural sample surveys, whose main goal is to provide precise, reliable information on businesses that comprise the diverse activity sectors in both areas.

Several methodological improvements were applied to the Structural Business Statistics in 2016 as part of the Project for the integration of the structural economic surveys. The results for 2016 are therefore not strictly comparable with those for previous years, as the evolution of the variables may reflect both possible actual changes in the period and the effects of the methodological improvements on the estimates of the above-mentioned variables.

The reference year 2021 implements several methodological improvements, in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2019/2152 of the European Parliament and of the Council, of 27 November 2019, and with Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2020/1197, of 30 July 2020.

The most significant changes affecting the Statistics and Accounts of the Cultural Companies are: the inclusion of Education (section P of the CCAE-2009); the extension of the sample of Arts, entertainment and recreation (section R), Repair of computers and personal and household goods (division 95 of the CCAE-2009) and Other personal service activities (division 96); the specification of which institutional sectors are covered by the Statistics, and, finally, an improvement in the estimation of the number of companies.

Consequently, as of 2021 the data are not strictly comparable with those of previous years.

For more information on the framework and sample design of the structural business surveys, you may consult the INE methodological report.

This publication offers a series of tables with the main magnitudes and economic concepts that reflect the importance of the cultural sector in the Catalan economy. The variables used are:

Value of production (basic prices)

Money flow which measures the value of goods and services produced by the company.

Intermediate consumption (basic prices)

Value of goods and services consumed as part of the production process, excluding capital assets.

Gross value added (basic prices)

Wealth generated during the period in question, which is obtained as the difference between the value of production and intermediate consumption.

Number of enterprises

The number of enterprises whose main economic activity falls in the cultural field according to the established boundary. Main economic activity is taken to mean the activity that creates the most added value or, if this data is lacking, the activity that generates the highest production value or gives employment to the most people.

People employed

Fixed or temporary personnel who, by performing their job, contribute to the production of goods or services or carry out auxiliary services to a company (administration, transport, warehousing).

Salaried employees

Employed people that are associated to the company by a work contract and are paid fixed or periodical amounts (salary, wage, commission, piecework or in kind).

Turnover

Sum of the amounts invoiced by the company over the reference year for the provision of services and sale of goods that are the object of the company's traffic. Sales are accounted for without including value added tax (VAT) and in net terms.

Consumption and work done by other companies

Sum of the value of consumption (purchases minus stock variation) of raw materials, other supplies and goods, and the value of work carried out by other companies or professionals in the sector. (This work must be part of their production process.)

Expenditure on external services

Expenditure on a range of different services provided by third parties.

Expenditure on personnel

Expenditure on all payments made by the company to its personnel as payment for their work, including social charges paid by the company.

3. The Statistics on Research and Development Activities (R&D)

The Statistics on Research and Development Activities (R&D) offer information relating to personnel dedicated to research activities, as well as expenditure on these activities. For the purposes of this publication, only the business sector is taken into account (businesses whose main activity falls in sections A to S, excluding sections O, P and division 94 of the CCAE-2009), although these statistics also brings together data on other institutional sectors such as higher education, public administration and not-for-profit private institutions.

For the purposes of this publication, results are provided on the following variables:

In-house R&D personnel

Directly employed staff working on in-house R&D activities, regardless of their level of responsibilities. This variable is expressed as full-time equivalent (FTE), which is the sum of the staff working full-time plus the sum of the fractions of time worked by part-time staff.

In-house R&D expenditure

It includes spending on creative work carried out within the company to increase the volume of knowledge and its use to devise new or improved products and processes (including software development). It therefore includes current costs (remuneration of internal staff assigned to in-house R&D activities and external staff working in situ on in-house R&D tasks) and capital expenditure (equipment and instruments and the acquisition of software and intellectual property products specific to in-house R&D).

The information published on staff and expenditure refers to companies with in-house R+D activity conducted in Catalonia, regardless of their headquarters' locations.

4. Survey on Innovation in Companies

The Survey on Innovation in Companies provides information on innovation processes within companies, based on indicators enabling us to understand these processes (expenditure on innovation, economic impact, types of innovative activities, etc.). It covers all farming, industrial, construction and service companies with 10 or more employees, in other words, businesses with their main activity in sections A to S, excluding sections O and P and division 94, of the CCAE-2009.

This survey follows the recommendations of the Oslo Manual, which contains the guidelines proposed by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to collect and interpret data on innovation.

In 2018, a methodological change was introduced by the implementation of the new 2018 revised edition of the Oslo Manual, which amended the definition of an innovative company, among other aspects, and triggered a break in the time series with respect to previous years' results.

From 2020 onwards, the Innovation in Companies Survey by INE will be conducted every two years, in even years.

For the purposes of this publication, from 2018 onwards, results are provided on the following variables:

Expenditure on innovative activities

This includes the total expenditure assigned to conducting any activity related to technological innovation. It therefore includes the expenditure on in-house R&D, on the procurement of R&D (outsourced R&D) as well as that related to innovative activities other than R&D, such as:

• Procurement of equipment and machinery, software, intellectual property rights or buildings for innovative activities other than R&D
• Procurement of external knowledge (patents, licences, registered trade marks)
• Product design, design services, preparation for production/distribution
• Employee professional training and development
• Marketing activities directly related to innovation other than R&D, including market research.

The information published refers to the expenditure on innovative activities of companies which have conducted innovative activity in Catalonia, regardless of where their head offices are located.

Companies with expenditure on innovative activities

This includes companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have conducted some innovative activity in the reference year.

Companies with product innovation during the period

This includes companies that have launched a good or service on the market that differs significantly from the company's previous goods or services.

The information published refers to companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have made product innovations in the reference year or in either of the two previous years.

Companies with business process innovations during the period

It includes companies that have implemented some new or improved business process for one or more of their business functions in their activities that differ significantly from the company's previous business process. The newly incorporated business functions can be any of the following business processes:

• Manufacturing or production methods of goods or services
• Logistical systems or delivery or distribution methods
• Information or communication processing methods
• Accounting methods or other administrative operations
• Business practices for organisational procedures or external relations
• Organisational methods of labour responsibility, decision-making or human resource management
• Marketing methods for promotion, packaging, price-setting, product positioning or after-sales service

The information published refers to companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have made some kind of innovation in their business processes in the reference year or in either of the two previous years.

Companies with product innovations or business process innovations during the period

It includes companies which have made some kind of product-related technological innovation and those which have made business process innovations.

The information published is related to companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have made some kind of innovation in the reference year or in either of the two previous years.

Until 2017, the Innovation in Companies Survey followed the 2005 Oslo Manual. Therefore, the indicators that are disseminated in this publication are:

Expenditure on technological innovation

It includes the total expenditure assigned to conducting any activity related to technological innovation. It therefore includes the expenditure on in-house and external R&D, as well as that related to other technologically innovative activities.

The information published corresponds to the expenditure on technological innovation of companies which have conducted innovative activity in Catalonia, regardless of where their head offices are located.

Companies with technological innovation activities

A technological innovation is a new or substantially improved product (goods or service) launched onto the market (so-called product innovation) or the introduction into the company of a new or significantly improved process (process innovation). The activities related to technological innovation are classified as follows:

• In-house R&D tasks
• R&D acquisition (external R&D)
• Activities related to the acquisition of machinery and equipment for technologically new or improved products and processes
• Acquisition of other external knowledge for innovation
• Training in innovative activities
• Introduction of innovations onto the market
• Design and other preparations for production and/or distribution

The information published corresponds to companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have conducted an activity related to technological innovation in the reference year.

Companies with technological innovations in the period

It includes companies which have conducted an activity related to technological innovation (as outlined in the previous section) in the reference year or in either of the two previous years. It includes companies with their head offices in Catalonia.

Companies with non-technological innovations in the period

It includes both companies which have innovated in organizational aspects (implementation of new organizational methods in the company's internal operations, organization of the workplace or external relations) and those which have innovated in marketing (implementation of new commercial strategies or concepts which have not previously been used).

The information published corresponds to companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have made non-technological innovations in the reference year or in either of the two previous years.

Companies with technological or non-technological innovations in the period

It includes both companies which have made some kind of technological innovation (related to the product or process) and those which have made non-technological innovations (related to organization or marketing).

The information published corresponds to companies with their head offices in Catalonia which have made some kind of innovation in the reference year or in either of the two previous years.

5. Foreign Trade

Foreign Trade results of the cultural sector are obtained from data from the Department of Customs and Excise Taxes (State Tax Administration Agency). Specifically, results are offered on the following variables:

Exports (trade delivered to other EU members)

Operations whereby goods or products originally from or produced in Catalonia are sent to another country.

Imports (trade delivered from other EU members)

Operations whereby goods or products originally from or produced in another country are purchased in Catalonia.

Balance of trade

Proportion of exports (deliveries to other countries) over imports (goods brought in from other countries).

These results are presented according to the groupings proposed for goods and products that the ESSnet-Culture working group considers cultural in foreign trade in accordance with the Combined Nomenclature (NC), which is the classification used in foreign trade statistics (table 2).