The National Accounts (NA) department is dedicated to producing macroeconomic aggregates that enable analysing the economy of Suriname and its development.
National accounts is a system of accounts that gives a quantified overview of the economic process of a country in a particular year. The system is also referred to as national accounting or annual national accounts.
History of national accounts in Suriname
Activities aiming to compile national accounts started in March 1973. In January 1974, Suriname published its first national accounts, which were based partly on the system of the United Nations (System of National Accounts 68, SNA 68) and partly on the system of accounts of the Netherlands. From 1985, estimates adhered to SNA 68, while SNA93 was followed as far as possible from 2001. The base year was moved from 1980 to 1990. In 2012, with the technical support of the Caribbean Regional Technical Assistance Centre (CARTAC), the base year was moved to 2007. ABS in 2019 expects to move the base year from 2007 to 2015, with the technical support of the Project for the Regional Advancement of Statistics in the Caribbean (PRASC), and implement SNA 2008.
What is the purpose of national accounts?
- Monitor the economy’s ‘behaviour’
- Conduct economic analyses and research
- Support economic policy-making & monitoring and decision-making
- Make international comparisons
Some examples of key macro-economic aggregates:
- Gross value added at current and constant prices
- Gross domestic product
- Gross national income
- National income per capita
- Disposable income
Estimation methods
According to SNA, there are three methods to measure macroeconomic aggregates:
the production method, the expenditure method and the income method.
The General Bureau of Statistics (ABS) currently uses the production method to estimate its aggregates.
Data sources:
- The Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Fisheries;
- The Ministry of Finance;
- The Forest Management and Forest Supervision Foundation;
- The Central Bank of Suriname;
- The Planning Office
- Enterprises / annual reports / research reports
- Households and different ABS departments
Survey forms are used every year to establish what has been a company’s production value and subsequently deduce its added value. Data are mainly collected from large companies and, as a rule, collection is in written form. In many cases, repeated personal visits to companies are required to obtain their replies, which makes data collecting a time-consuming process.
In Suriname, the national accounts figures of any particular year are usually published about 6-9 months after the end of that year.