Following Decision 46/107 taken by the Statistical Commission at its 46th session in 2015, a handbook on a system of extended international and global accounts will be prepared, which will serve as the measurement framework for international trade and economic globalization. This handbook will build on existing work in this area, in particular by the UNECE, the OECD and Eurostat, and address issues of micro-data linking of business and trade statistics, as well as address the integration of economic, environmental and social dimensions of trade and globalization as an extension of the System of National Accounts 2008 (2008 SNA) and the System of Environmental-Economic Accounting 2012 (SEEA 2012).
The first meeting of the expert group is scheduled to take place on 26-28 January 2016 at the UN headquarters in New York. The Handbook is of course the main topic of discussion at this meeting.
The Handbook will refer to and build upon the work of the Friend of the Chair group, which concluded that improved statistics are necessary and should bring a better understanding of the role of the external sector in an economy, the openness of its domestic and foreign markets and the impact of openness on social, economic and environmental upgrading, including the level and quality of employment. More and better data is needed in developed, emerging and developing economies alike: interconnected economies require interconnected statistics and all economies can benefit from a better understanding of these relationships.