Australian Transport Economic Account

23.69    The Australian Transport Economic Account (ATEA) is an experimental thematic account that is intended to provide a comprehensive picture of transport activity performed throughout all sectors of the Australian economy. The inaugural account was released in 2018, covering the period from 2010-11 to 2015-16. A second account was released in 2023, extending the reference period to 2020-21.

23.70    The role of the ATEA is to identify the full extent of transport activities in the economy; that is, beyond what is undertaken by businesses in the transport industry. It combines transport activity conducted on a for-hire basis by businesses in the transport industry, and transport activity undertaken by businesses that are in non-transport industries. The transport activity undertaken by non-transport businesses is called in-house transport.

23.71    There are currently no international standards or guidelines for developing a transport thematic account. The methodology used for the ATEA follows the United States and Canadian transport accounts, with some variations due to differences in available data sources. Scope 

23.72    Total transport activity is defined as:

• For-hire transport activity undertaken by businesses within the transport, postal and warehousing industry (Division I), e.g., air passenger transport by commercial airlines or transport of goods by freight transport businesses; and
• In-house transport activity of businesses in other (non-transport) industries, including:
  • ancillary transport activity (which is not intended for market) undertaken in the production of an industry’s primary output. An example of this activity is a retail business using their own truck to deliver goods from a warehouse to their retail outlet.
  • secondary production of transport activity for market, where a fee is charged. For example, where that same retail business uses their own truck to deliver those goods to the customer for a delivery fee.

23.73    To maintain consistency with the national accounts, transport services provided by households for their own use are not in scope of the ATEA.

23.74    Transport gross value added:  the value of the output of transport products (including both for-hire and in-house transport) for all industries less the value of the inputs used in producing these transport products. Output is measured at basic prices; that is ,before any taxes on transport products are added (or any subsidies on transport products are deducted). GVA is used for comparisons between industries because it is free of the effects of taxes and subsidies on products, which can vary between industries and over time, and do not represent value added by the industry producing that product.  

23.75    Total transport GDP:  a construct of this account to enable a direct comparison with other GDP measures. While transport GDP is useful in this context, the total transport GVA measure should be used when making comparisons with other industries.

23.76    Transport margins:  transport charges paid separately by the purchaser. This is in accordance with System of National Accounts 2008 (2008 SNA). In the ATEA delivery, charges are included if they were invoiced separately and the delivery was undertaken by vehicles owned by the business.

Transport Industry and Activity Survey

23.77    Detailed data was collected in the Transport Industry and Activity Survey (TIAS) for the 2010-11 and 2020-21 reference years. The TIAS is a subset of the Economic Activity Survey. Less detailed data was collected in other years through ongoing EAS collections.

23.78    Key use of data:

• Expenditure on each mode of transport
• Transport specific expenditure grouped into fuel; repairs, parts, and maintenance; rental, leasing and hiring; and registration fees and transport vehicle insurance
• The input structure of in-house transport for each ANZSIC industry.

Australian National Accounts: Supply Use Tables

 23.79    Key use of data: 

• Informs the calculation of in-house transport output, by backcasting TIAS data and calibrating TIU totals for all industries. This ensures full coverage of the ATEA scope and consistency with the supply-use tables. 

Census of Population and Housing

 23.80    Key use of data:  Census data is used to calculate the occupation by industry ratios used to estimate transport related and warehousing employed persons.

Labour Account, Australia

23.81    Key use of data:  Used to provide industry and, for Division I, subdivision level estimates of transport related and warehousing employed persons.

Labour Force, Australia

23.82    Key use of data:  Used to calculate the male and female employment ratios for each ANZSIC industry.

Gross value added

23.83    Total transport activity is calculated by adding Division I estimates from the national accounts with in-house transport estimates for all other industries, as generated in the ATEA.

23.84    To derive the direct GVA estimates for the ADIA, the following steps are taken: 

1. Identify expenditure on transport related inputs (TRIs) for non-Division I industries using the 2020-21 TIAS. The transport related inputs are categorised as:

• Fuel
• Repairs, maintenance, parts, and accessories
• Registration fees and transport vehicle insurance, including tolls and network access fees
• Rental, leasing and hiring.

2. Use the TIAS data to calculate the ratio of transport output to transport input for each mode of transport, i.e., how much transport output is produced from the value of transport related inputs used.
3. Use the output estimates to produce other key financial indicators (i.e., intermediate use, compensation of employees, taxes and subsidies, industry value added and GDP), using the relationships reported in the TIAS 2020-21 data.
4. Estimate general government activity, which is out of scope of the TIAS (except for units in water supply, sewerage, and drainage services, e.g., ANZSIC Subdivision 28) but is an important component of in-house transport activity. To account for this missing activity, the ATEA rebases transport related expenditure as reported in the 2020-21 TIAS to TIU levels in the 2020-21 supply-use tables.
5. Back cast detailed transport data collected in the 2020-21 TIAS to 2010-11, using the movements of the most relevant product in the supply-use tables for each industry. For example, the time series for fuel inputs to in-house road transport for the construction industry are imputed using movements in the supply-use product automotive petroleum and coal products in the construction industry. The supply-use tables capture COVID-19 impacts in the timeseries.

23.85    Refer to the methodology page for more information.