Changes to ABS statistical work program

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) is making changes to its statistical work program to ensure it continues to appropriately measure the Australian economy and society.

The Australian Statistician, Dr David Gruen, said: “The ABS has been at the forefront of measuring the impact of COVID-19 on our economy and society.

“When we began publishing new COVID-19 statistics in March 2020, we indicated our intention to periodically review the new outputs to ensure they continued to meet people’s needs, and to refine our approach as necessary. 

“After the most recent review, we will make further changes to our statistical work program from 1 July 2021.”

New products

The ABS is developing a suite of monthly indicators tracking household spending, business turnover and employee earnings.  The release of these indicators is due to begin later this year.

“These new monthly indicators will complement our existing statistics and make greater use of non-survey administrative and transactions data," Dr Gruen said. "We will be publishing more information on this soon.”

Products coming to an end

The ABS introduced a range of COVID-19 related products from mid-March 2020 as the pandemic escalated, some of which will be stopped from 1 July 2021.

“In several instances, we introduced preliminary data to deliver more timely insights, such as retail trade, merchandise trade, mortality statistics and overseas travel,” Dr Gruen said. “We also started new, smaller surveys: Household Impacts of COVID-19, and Business Conditions and Sentiments (initially called Business Impacts of COVID-19).”

Given the rest of our statistical program and with new products in development, the ABS is not in a position to continue all these products after June 2021. Further information on individual products is in the table below. 

Delays to the statistical work program

COVID-19 continues to pose challenges for the ABS forward work program.  Changes to the work program were announced in April 2020 and today’s announcement includes further changes.

Under normal circumstances, the ABS conducts the Household Expenditure Survey (HES) every six years, with the next survey due to begin data collection in June 2021.

However, the restrictions imposed to suppress COVID-19 have led to significant changes to household expenditure – for example, expenditure on a range of services including travel services. This means current patterns of household expenditure are unlikely to be sustained over the next few years.

Rather than start collecting data for this survey in June, the ABS is delaying the HES by two years. As well as enabling measurement of more normalised patterns of expenditure, doing this will allow the ABS to investigate other sources of data to supplement the HES and look at ways to make the survey less burdensome for households.

Other changes include the Survey of Income and Housing, reverting from its temporary quarterly cycle to its standard biennial one.