Structure

This phase/study comprises two chapters, the first one having introductive character is related to some general theoretical-methodological aspects of the TSA regionalisation process, and the second chapter aims to present some methodological aspects in the field of TSA implementation at regional level in some specific countries/regions.

From the very beginning, it has to be clearly stated that there is no conceptual framework at regional level for the Tourism Satellite Account. One can talk at most about some theoretical-methodological issues presented in the literature that were presented in the study. These referred to the following:

• Concepts and definitions for the regional TSA level (region, regional tourism, expenditure related to regional tourism, regional tourism consumption)
• General guidelines to develop TSA at regional level
• Very brief considerations regarding the difficulties encountered in developing TSA at regional level

The general guidelines for developing TSA at regional level referred to presenting some general principles, a checklist for a regional TSA as well as the two main general approaches to adapt TSA at regional level (interregional approach and regional approach). Among the difficulties encountered in the development of TSA at regional level one can mention the lack of statistical data at this level and the fact that many concepts from National Accounts are not applicable at regional level; one can add also some institutional difficulties.

The second part of the study concerns the international practices in the field of TSA at regional level from the methodological point of view (technical specifications in fact). More precisely, a number of twelve regions/countries have been included in our analysis: Flanders and Brussels (Belgium), Norway, Finland, Austria, Andalusia (Spain), Australia, Denmark, Canada, Wales (United Kingdom), Poland, Portugal and Italy. For each country, a brief presentation of some methodological aspects has been performed, having as reference different types of papers disseminated in English language (articles, conference papers, WTO publications etc.). One can consider that most of the countries presented in the study represent in fact best practices in this field. In addition to methodological issues, depending on data availability, for each country, some institutional aspects have been also presented, referring to the institutions involved in the regional TSA compilation.

 

The second phase of the project aimed for the beginning to present the best practices at international level in the field of TSA implementation at regional level, strictly from the perspective of results obtained by the 14 countries investigated – Belgium, Norway, Finland, Austria, Spain, Australia, Denmark, Canada, United Kingdom, Poland, Italy, Portugal, India and China. Just as a reminder, in the previous phase of the project (phase I) only some methodological aspects were presented (technical specifications) without making an analysis of the obtained results. The analysis of the TSA results has been carried out both for each country individually and by centralization of some common elements such as level of territorial disaggregation, disaggregation of tourism consumption by products and disaggregation of gross value added by tourism industries, number of tables of results, existence of TSA extensions – indirect effects, reference period with published data. In addition, here the purpose was to obtain some empirical results by:

• Comparing data regarding tourism’s total economic contribution versus direct economic contribution at, both at regional level
• Comparing data regarding the economic contribution of tourism at regional level versus economic contribution of tourism at national level – both for direct effect and total (direct + indirect) effects
• Calculating the weight of regional tourism in country’s tourism (from the perspective of the TSA aggregates)
• Presenting data comparability at regional level through TSA aggregates expressed in absolute values

Also, the analysis of international practices envisaged the presentation of some difficulties and challenges encountered by countries/regions in the TSA compilation at regional level.

The second component of this phase aimed to present some regional characteristics of tourism in Romania at the level of its development regions: Centre, North-East, South-East, South-Muntenia, South-West Oltenia, West, North-West and Bucharest-Ilfov. Thus, the following topics have been investigated: the main tourism forms for each development region as these derive from the strategic documents of each region; programs, plans and regional initiatives for tourism development; an analysis of the accommodation infrastructure and of regional characteristics of tourism flows; a description of the profile of Romanian tourists; an analysis of employment in the Hotels and restaurants sector from the perspective of indicators represented by average number of employees and average net monthly earnings per employee, and not the least, a presentation of the economic results of the units activating in the Hotels and restaurants sector using two representative indicators (number of active enterprises and turnover).

The third component of this phase has envisaged an evaluation of the data sources necessary to compile TSA at regional level in Romania as well as, an identification of the main data gaps in the statistical data. In this regard, for the beginning, the possibilities for regional disaggregation of the indicators resulted from the data sources used in the TSA compilation at national level have been analyzed. The reference data were National Accounts, on the one hand, and national TSA on the other hand. The reference period considered was 2011-2017 when these data are available for TSA in Romania (2017 is the last year having TSA data and 2011 is the first year with such published data).

Overall, data regionalization from TSA has to follow, as far as possible, the same rules used in the National Accounts. Enterprise statistics provides some useful data in this endeavour but other data sources have been also investigated in this regard: international trips registered at the borders, passenger transportation statistics, social insurance statistics regarding the number of tickets for spa treatments, culture statistics regarding the number of visitors at museums, population statistics, Population an Housing Census data regarding number of holiday homes, data on the capacity of accommodation and food and beverages units, data on the household’s consumption expenditures which have relevance for tourism, employment data in the accommodation establishments.

Identifying the main data gaps (deficiencies) was also needed in order to better raise awareness on the availability of statistics for our country. These data gaps were structured on the following levels:

• Lack of data regarding the tourism demand of residents separately for each development region of Romania
• Inaccuracies in the identification and regional allocation of tourism expenditures made by foreign residents (non-residents)
• Insufficient level of detail for data from Regional National Accounts
• Lack of Input-Output tables at regional level
• Lack of regional disaggregation of employment data calculated according to National Accounts methodology
• Lack of specific tourism surveys at regional level
• Lack of regional stratification and of data collection at CAEN classes (4 digits) in the case of Labour Cost Survey
• Disadvantages in using data from certain statistical surveys (i.e. Structural Business Survey)

 

The 3rd phase of the project aimed for the beginning to present the technical specifications of the Tourism Satellite Account (TSA) method applied at regional level in Romania. A top-down methodology was used, meaning the regionalization of national TSA data which are disaggregated at regional level. In this regard some indicators closely related to the national aggregates were used.The final purpose is constructing some regionalized TSA aggregates that characterize the economic size of tourism in each development region of Romania. This is the result of a complex compilation process that follows the principles and methodology from the National Regional Accounts together with producing some estimates for the distribution of TSA aggregates by regions. Of course, these estimates are specific to TSA, more precisely to its adaptation at regional level and do not affect the national TSA figures which are the benchmark ones.

In a practical manner, the data regionalization refers to apportioning the national values to each of the eight Romania’s regions based on some coefficients named distribution keys. These distribution keys are specific for each TSA aggregate and are calculated based on different statistical indicators. For instance, in case of regionalizing the aggregate Gross value added in the tourism industries the indicators used are Expenses for compensation of employees from the Labour Cost Survey in combination with Gross earnings and Average number of employees from the Structural Business Survey, both surveys being carried out by National Institute of Statistics (INS). 

A peculiarity is regionalizing tourism expenditure made through different approaches by forms of tourism. Thus, regionalizing inbound tourism expenditure (of foreign/non residents visiting Romania) has been made only at the level of total expenditure due to lack of data; however, in this case a differentiation has been made between day visitors and overnight tourists. Nevertheless, in case of domestic tourism the regionalization of domestic tourism expenditure has been made at the level of each constituent product (types o expenses) but without differentiating between day visitors and overnight tourists; in general, for most of the products (excepting passenger transportation, cultural services and the residual category <Other consumption products>), the indicator of Turnover of local units (from Structural Business Survey) is used for regionalization either as a stand-alone indicator or in combination with other indicators. 

The second section of this phase envisaged developing some estimates to cover lack of data. These estimates considered the TSA aggregates and their components. For instance, in the case of foreign day visitors (for estimating the expenditure of these visitors), only arrivals at the border from citizens coming from neighbouring countries have been considered by each border point and each development region – excepting Centre region where, due to its location in the middle of the country and its accessibility by road and rail make this region to be impossible for visiting in a day trip – as a trip without overnight stay. In case of overnight foreign tourists, a combination of indicators has been used, based on the two surveys carried out by INS: ACNER survey on tourism expenditure of non-residents and the Survey on the occupancy of accommodation establishments. For the category <Other components of tourism consumption> the estimates have been produced separately for its two sub-categories <Household final consumption expenditure in kind> and <Social transfers in kind> (Expenditure for medical treatment and rest).

The third section of this phase aimed the experimental compilation of TSA aggregates at regional level. In a practical manner, through these aggregates the economic contribution of tourism in each development region is revealed. The following aggregates have been regionalized (calculated at the regional level):

• Internal tourism consumption

• Gross value added of tourism industries

• Tourism direct gross value added

• Tourism direct gross domestic product

• Employment in the tourism industries

Apart from these aggregates it should be noted that both some regionalized detailed data for the period 2011-2017 and some key figures regarding the economic contribution of tourism for each development region have been presented. These key figures (for the reference year 2017 – the last year with available data) were disseminated as results of the project by sending them by email (09.10.2020) to all 8 regional development agencies in Romania. The last component of this phase referred to dissemination of project results and included besides sending the key results to regional development agencies also drafting two articles (as manuscripts) to be published in prestigious international journals; also, in addition, another two articles have been elaborated to be published in Romanian journals indexed in international database. At the same time, one should mention two online participations at international conferences in the tourism field. Not the least, some recommendations have been provided to guide any other similar exercise in the future that has to consider some improvements of the existing data sources and performing additional surveys. It has to be mentioned that in this project an experimental calculation has been made based only on the existing data sources during the project’s period (October 2018 – October 2020) and data were produced by INS and other institutions in charge (administrative data). Also, it should be added that all calculations in this project considered only the direct effects of tourism expenditure/consumption as long as TSA is measuring only the direct economic contribution of tourism.