Public Notification: Release of Lists of Business Characteristics
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), in accordance with the requirements of section 14 of the Census and Statistics (Information Release and Access) Determination 2018, made under section 13 of the Census and Statistics Act 1905, may disclose lists of business characteristics.
To release a list of business characteristics, the Australian Statistician or delegate must:
- approve in writing the release of the list.
- be given an undertaking in relation to the information specifying that the individual or organisation covered by the undertaking:
- will use the list only for purposes specified in the undertaking which do not involve enforcing any obligation or liability applicable under any enactment; and
- will comply with any other condition that, in the opinion of the Statistician, is reasonably necessary in a particular case; and
- will not, except for the purposes specified in the undertaking, release the list to:
- if the list is to be disclosed to an individual — another individual, or an organisation; or
- if the list is to be disclosed to an organisation — an individual outside the organisation or another organisation.
- failure to comply with these terms and conditions may be an offence under subsection 19(3) of the Census and Statistics Act 1905, the penalty for which is a fine of up to 120 penalty units ($37,560), or imprisonment for 2 years, or both.
- make publicly available within 28 days of the disclosure, a description of the release.
Releases since 1 January 2020 are contained below.
2024
1/2024
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES).
Name of Collection:
Release of Lists of Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences.
Other particulars:
Three separate lists consisting of business contact details (including name, address and telephone number) taken from the Australian Business Register (ABR) based ABS Business Register were provided to ABARES, for farm businesses selected by ABARES in the 2023-24 ABARES Farm Survey Program.
Lists were disclosed between 30 November 2023 and 11 January 2024
Purpose of release:
The information contained in the lists will be used to support the conduct of the 2023-24 ABARES Farm Surveys Program, through supplementing data holdings to avoid the need to collect this information in surveys.
ABS provided:
- business contact details (including name, address and telephone number) for farm businesses selected in an ABARES Farm Survey.
Subsequent list releases will comprise of:
Selected information (measure of size in ranged values, one or more geographic codes, latitude, and longitude coordinates, ANZSIC, secondary activity indicators, unique identifying number) for farm businesses responding to an ABARES Farm Survey.
1/2024
2023
5/2023
Released to:
Australian Government Department of Education (DoE)
Name of Collection:
Release of a list of names of non-government schools and aggregate measures of the income of parents or guardians of students
Other particulars:
The DoE has provided the ABS with a signed undertaking, which outlines agreed upon terms and conditions for the use and management of the information disclosed.
The list was disclosed to the DoE on 28 October 2023.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used by the DoE for the purpose of the Capacity to Contribute project, which is to inform research, policy decisions and calculations of the amount of base recurrent funding to non-government schools from the Commonwealth Government under the Australian Education Act 2013.
ABS provided:
• school name, school identifier and school sector;
• school geographic area;
• derived standardised scores for direct measure of income, for 2021, 2022 and 2023;
• derived scores for Capacity to Contribute for 2024;
• summary measures of parental income, and associated missingness, accuracy and volatility measures;
• average family size;
• linkage and coverage rates of administrative data;
• deemed reviewed scores and supporting metrics or quality indicators.
5/2023
4/2023
Released to:
• Australian Government Department of Education
• New South Wales Department of Education
• Victorian Department of Education
• South Australian Department for Education and Child Development
• Western Australia Department of Education
• Tasmania Department for Education, Children and Young People
• Northern Territory Department of Education
• Australian Capital Territory Education Directorate
Name of Collection:
Release of List of Preschool Service Providers to State and Territory Education Departments
Other particulars:
Each receiving department has provided the ABS with a signed undertaking, which outlines agreed upon terms and conditions for the use and management of the information disclosed. Further information on this undertaking can be found in the attached Public Notification document.
The ABS has released the list annually since 2011.
The list was disclosed to 8 Jurisdictions on the 1 June 2023.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used by the departments for the purpose of achieving the outcomes and specified objectives of the National Information Agreement on Early Childhood Education and Care (NIA ECEC). The NIA ECEC aims to ensure the availability of a nationally consistent, quality information base for early childhood education and care, to support policy and program developments, and reporting and accountability requirements. The ABS has released the list annually since 2011.
ABS provided:
For each business in the list, the ABS provides:
• business name and address
• trading name
• management type
• service type and
• state/territory.
4/2023
3/2023
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES).
Name of Collection:
Release of Lists of Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences.
Other particulars:
Three lists consisting of business contact details were sourced from the Australian Business Register (ABR) based ABS Business Register.
The lists were disclosed between 23 May and 29 May 2023.
Purpose of release:
The information contained in the lists will be used to support conduct of the 2023-24 ABARES Farm Surveys Program to supplement data holdings to avoid the need to collect this information in surveys.
ABS provided:
• business contact details (including name, address, telephone number) for farm businesses selected in an ABARES Farm Surveys.
Subsequent list releases will comprise of:
• selected information (measure of size in ranged values, one or more geographic codes, latitude, and longitude coordinates, ANZSIC, secondary activity indicators, unique identifying number) for farm businesses responding to an ABARES Farm Survey.
3/2023
2/2023
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES)
Name of Collection:
Release of List of Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences
Other particulars:
The list of de-identified farm businesses was sourced from the Australian Business Register (ABR) based ABS Business Register and will subsequently release contact details for a selection of those farm businesses.
The list was disclosed on 27 April 2023.
Purpose of release:
Data contained in the list will be used to support conduct of the 2023-24 ABARES Farm Surveys. Information will also be made available for selected farm businesses to supplement data holdings and avoid the need to collect this information in surveys.
ABS provided:
• a unique identifying number (concorded to identifying numbers provided in previous years for the purposes of sampling methodology)
• a measure of size (Estimated Value of Agricultural Operations (EVAO) where available or Standardised BAS Total Sales (SBTS) where EVAO is not available)
• geographic codes (Australian Statistical Geography Standard, Edition 3)
• latitude and longitude co-ordinates
• an industry classification code (ANZSIC)
• a set of secondary activity indicators (where available).
Subsequent list releases will comprise of:
• business contact details (including name, address, telephone number) for farm businesses selected in an ABARES Farm Survey
• selected information (measure of size in ranged values, one or more geographic codes, latitude, and longitude coordinates, ANZSIC, secondary activity indicators, unique identifying number) for farm businesses responding to an ABARES Farm Survey.
2/2023
1/2023
Released to:
National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA)
Name of Collection:
Release of List of Agricultural Farm Businesses to the National Emergency Management Agency
Other particulars:
The list of de-identified farm businesses was sourced from the Australian Business Register (ABR) based ABS Business Register and will subsequently release characteristics of those farm businesses.
Purpose of release:
Data contained in the list will be analysed by NEMA to support their understanding of the impact of natural disasters on Australia’s agricultural industry and improve their ability to respond to such events.
ABS provided:
• an ABS-generated record identifier
• latitude and longitude co-ordinates
• geographic codes (Australian Statistical Geography Standard, Edition 3)
• an industry classification code (Australian and New Zealand Standard Industrial Classification)
• a measure of size (Estimated Value of Agricultural Operations (EVAO) where available or Standardised BAS Total Sales (SBTS) where EVAO is not available)
• area of holding (hectares)
• a set of secondary indicators of agricultural activities where available
1/2023
2022
8/2022
Released to:
Department of Education (DoE)
Name of Collection:
Release of list of non-government schools to the Department of Education
Other particulars:
The list of names of non-government schools and aggregate measures of the income of parents or guardians of students. The information was sourced from data integrated by the ABS from DoE and the Multi-Agency Data Integration Project (MADIP).
Purpose of release:
This information will be used by the DoE for the purpose of the Capacity to Contribute project, which is to inform research, policy decisions and calculations of the amount of base recurrent funding to non-government schools from the Commonwealth Government under the Australian Education Act 2013.
ABS provided:
• school name, school identifier and school sector;
• school geographic area;
• derived standardised scores for direct measure of income, for 2020, 2021 and 2022;
• derived scores for Capacity to Contribute for 2023;
• summary measures of parental income, and associated missingness, accuracy and volatility measures;
• average family size;
• linkage and coverage rates of administrative data;
• deemed reviewed scores and supporting metrics or quality indicators.
7/2022
Released to:
• National Recovery and Resilience Agency (NRRA)
• Resilience New South Wales (Resilience NSW)
Name of Collection:
Release of Business Register to the National Recovery and Resilience Agency and Resilience New South Wales
Other particulars:
The list of business characteristics from the ABS Business Register for businesses with active ABNs within flood impacted areas were identified by the NRRA in New South Wales in July 2022.
Purpose of release:
This information will be used by the NRRA and Resilience NSW to support the management of the flood events.
The list will be used in conjunction with other information sources to:
1. Identify large businesses exposed to the severe weather and flooding event.
2. Understand the profile of all affected businesses to tailor recovery support, including the provision of grants and loans, and
3. Brief senior officials and Ministers.
ABS provided:
• Australian Business Number (ABN)
• Local Government Area Code
• Local Government Area Name
• Employment Size Range
• Industry
• ABN Entity Name
• Trading Name
• Business Address
• Business Locality
• Business State
• Business Postcode
• Latitude
• Longitude
• Scope flag to indicate whether the ABN is in scope of the Counts of Australian Business, including Entries and Exits (CABEE) publication.
6/2022
Released to:
• Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment
• New South Wales Department of Education
• Department of Education and Training Victoria
• Department of Education - Queensland
• South Australia's Department for Education
• Western Australia Department of Education
• Australian Capital Territory Education Directorate
Name of Collection:
Release of list of preschool service providers to state and territory education departments
Other particulars:
The list of businesses operating preschool programs in Australia were taken from the ABS 2021 National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used for the purpose of achieving outcomes and specified objectives of the National Information Agreement on Early Childhood Education and Care (NIA ECEC). The NIA ECEC aims to ensure the availability of a nationally consistent, quality information base for early childhood education and care, to support policy and program development, and reporting and accountability requirements.
ABS provided:
• business name and address
• trading name
• management type
• service type
• state/territory
5/2022
Released to:
National Recovery and Resilience Agency and Department of Education, Skills and Employment
Name of Collection:
Release of Business Register to National Recovery and Resilience Agency (NRRA) and Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE)
Other particulars:
Business characteristics are from the ABS Business Register for NSW/QLD businesses with active ABNs and within the flood impacted areas, to support a natural disaster and emergency situation.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used in conjunction with other information sources to:
1. Identify large businesses affected by the recent floods in NSW and QLD.
2. Understand the profile of affected businesses to tailor recovery support.
3. Contact relevant businesses during the development of support packages.
4. Brief Executive and Ministers.
ABS provided:
- ABN
- Local Government Area Code
- Local Government Area Name
- Employment Size Range
- Industry
- ABN Entity Name
- Trading Name
- Business Address
- Business Locality
- Business State
- Business Postcode
- Contact Name
- Contact Phone Number (except for those businesses with a Sole Trader Type of Legal Organisation and less than 4 employees)
- Contact Mobile Number (except for those businesses with a Sole Trader Type of Legal Organisation and less than 4 employees)
- Latitude
- Longitude
4/2022
Released to:
National Recovery and Resilience Agency (NRRA) and Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE)
Name of Collection:
Release of Business Register to National Recovery and Resilience Agency (NRRA) and Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE).
Other particulars:
Business characteristics are from the ABS Business Register for NSW/QLD businesses within the scope of ‘Counts of Australian Businesses, Entries and Exits’ and within the flood impacted areas, to support a natural disaster and emergency situation.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used in conjunction with other information sources to:
1. Identify large businesses affected by the recent floods in NSW and QLD.
2. Understand the profile of affected businesses to tailor recovery support.
3. Contact relevant businesses during the development of support packages.
4. Brief Executive and Ministers.
ABS provided:
- ABS Business Register Unit ID
- ABN
- Local Government Area Code
- Local Government Area Name
- Employment Size Range
- Industry
- ABN/Type of Activity Unit Entity Name
- Trading Name
- Business Address (or Type of Activity Entity Postal Address)
- Business Locality
- Business State
- Business Postcode
- Contact Name
- Contact Phone Number (except for those businesses with a Sole Trader Type of Legal Organisation and less than 4 employees)
- Contact Mobile Number (except for those businesses with a Sole Trader Type of Legal Organisation and less than 4 employees)
- Latitude
- Longitude
3/2022
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES)
Name of Collection:
Release of List of Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences
Other particulars:
List of de-identified farm businesses taken from the Australian Business Register (ABR) based ABS Business Register and will subsequently release contact details for a selection of those farm businesses.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used to support conduct of the 2022-23 ABARES Farm Surveys. Information will also be made available for selected farm businesses to supplement data holdings and avoid the need to collect this information in surveys.
ABS provided:
- a measure of size based on the estimated value of agricultural operations where available or Standardised Business Activity Statement derived size identifier
- one or more geographic codes (ASGS), down to the SA1 level
- latitude and longitude as a geographic identifier
- an industry classification code (ANZSIC)
- a set of secondary activity indicators (where available)
- a unique identifying number (concorded to identifying numbers provided in previous years for the purposes of sampling methodology).
Subsequent list releases will comprise:
- business contact details (including name, address, telephone number) for farm businesses selected in an ABARES Farm Survey
- selected information (measure of size in ranged values, one or more geographic codes, latitude, and longitude coordinates, ANZSIC, secondary activity indicators, unique identifying number) for farm businesses responding to an ABARES Farm Survey.
Reference: 2/2022
Released to:
Meld Studios Pty Ltd
Name of Collection:
Business List to Meld Studios Pty Ltd
Other particulars:
Business characters are from the Survey of Producer Prices.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used to enable an expert contractor to accompany the ABS in conducting user research and end to end design of services with businesses currently selected in Producer and International Trade Price Index (PITPI) surveys.
ABS provided:
- Name of Prices Survey Business is selected in
- Business name
- Business contact name
- Business contact phone number
- Business contact email address
- Industry of Business
- Business size
- Data submission channel used (inc. frequency)
Reference: 1/2022
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES)
Name of Collection:
Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences
Other particulars:
List of de-identified farm businesses taken from the Australian Business Register based ABS Business Register.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used to support conduct of the 2021 Australian Horticulture Survey (AHS).
ABS provided:
- a measure of size based on the estimated value of agricultural operations where available or Standardised Business Activity Statement derived size identifier
- one or more geographic codes (ASGS), down to the SA1 level
- latitude and longitude as a geographic identifier
- an industry classification code (ANZSIC)
- a set of secondary activity indicators (where available)
- a unique identifying number (concorded to identifying numbers provided in previous years for the purposes of sampling methodology).
2021
Reference: 5/2021
Released to:
Department of Education, Skills and Employment (DESE)
Name of Collection:
Non-Government Schools to the Department of Education, Skills and Employment
Other particulars:
List of names of non-government schools and aggregate measures of income of parents or guardians of students, sourced from data integrated by the ABS from DESE and the Multi-Agency Data Integration Project.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used for the purpose of the Capacity to Contribute project, in order to inform research, policy decisions and calculations of the amount of base recurrent funding to non-government schools for the Commonwealth Government under the Australian Education Act 2013.
ABS provided:
- school name, school identifier and school sector
- school geographic area
- derived standardised scores for direct measure of income, for 2019, 2020 and 2021
- derived scores for Capacity to Contribute for 2022
- summary measures of parental income, and associated missingness, accuracy and volatility measures
- average family size
- linkage and coverages rate of administrative data
Reference: 4/2021
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES)
Name of Collection:
Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics and Sciences
Other particulars:
List of de-identified farm businesses taken from the Australian Business Register based ABS Business Register.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used to support conducting the 2022 Pest Animal and Weed Management Survey (PAWS)
ABS provided:
- a measure of size based on the estimated value of agricultural operations where available or Standardised Business Activity Statement derived size identifier
- one or more geographic codes (ASGS), down to SA1 level
- latitude and longitude as a geographic identifier
- an industry classification code (ANZSIC)
- a set of secondary activity indicators, where available
- a unique identifying number (concorded to identifying numbers provided in previous years for the purposes of sampling methodology)
Reference: 3/2021
Released to:
Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences (ABARES)
Name of Collection:
Agricultural Farm Businesses to Australian Bureau of Agriculture and Resource Economics and Sciences
Other particulars:
List of de-identified farm businesses taken from the Australian Business Register based ABS Business Register.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used for the purpose of designing and selecting samples for the following ABARES farm surveys: 2021 Australian Agricultural and Grazing Industries Survey (AAGIS); 2021 Australian Dairy Industry Survey (ADIS); and 2021 Murray-Darling Basin Irrigation Survey (Irrigation).
ABS provided:
- a measure of size based on the estimated value of agricultural operations where available or Standardised Business Activity Statement derived size identifier
- one or more geographic codes (ASGS), down to SA1 level
- latitude and longitude as a geographic identifier
- an industry classification code (ANZSIC)
- a set of secondary activity indicators, where available
- a unique identifying number (concorded to identifying numbers provided in previous years for the purposes of sampling methodology)
Reference: 2/2021
Released to:
Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment, NSW Department of Education, Department of Education and Training Victoria, Department of Education QLD, SA Department of Education, WA Department of Education, and ACT Education Directorate
Name of Collection:
Preschool service providers to state and territory education departments
Other particulars:
List of businesses operation preschool programs in Australia, taken from the ABS 2020 National Early Childhood Education and Care Collection.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used for the purpose of achieving outcomes and specified objectives of the National Information Agreement on Early Childhood Education and Care (NIA ECEC). The NIA ECEC aims to ensure the availability of a nationally consistent, quality information base for early childhood education and care, to support policy and program development, and reporting and accountability requirements.
ABS provided:
- business name and address
- trading name
-management type
- service type
- state/territory
Reference: 1/2021
Released to:
EY Sweeney
Name of Collection:
Accounting Software Market Study
Other particulars:
Business characteristics are from the ABS Business Register and Quarterly Business Indicators Survey.
Purpose of release:
The list will be used for market research conducted on behalf of the ABS to determine the take up rates of Small Business Enterprises to provide data to the ABS through their accounting software.
ABS provided:
• Name of Business (legal name and trading name)
• Broad industry classification
• Employment size group
• State
• Name of contact(s)
• Telephone number of contact(s)
• Mobile number of contact(s)
• Email address of contact(s)
• A flag indicating if the businesses had been in the QBIS sample since March 2018
2020
Number: 04/2020
Collection:
Release of List of Non-Government Schools to the Department of Education, Skills and Employment
When tabled:
Not Applicable
Number: 03/2020
Collection:
Release of List of Preschool Service Providers to State and Territory Education Departments
When tabled:
Not Applicable
Number: 02/2020
Collection:
Release of lists of Agricultural Farm Businesses for the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics and Sciences
When tabled:
Not Applicable
Number: 01/2020
Collection:
Release of Lists of Business to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and the Department of Health
When tabled:
Not Applicable
Prior to 2020
For documents prior to 2020 see Releases prior to 2020 page.