Scientific, Technical and Economic Committee for Fisheries (STECF) : quality aspects of the collection of economic data - methods of calculation of the indicators and sampling strategies : SGECA-09-02

The assessment of quality of economic data is a relevant issue that has been raised by several working groups and by different bodies (first of all STECF and RCMs). This issue also affects end users that should be aware of the reliability of data used in the analysis. The new Data Collection Framework establishes the list of economic variables to be collected for the total fleets and for the fleet segments. It also requires Member States to describe the methodologies applied for the data collection and to give information on the quality (accuracy and precision) of estimates. Thus, SGECA 09-02 was asked to give appropriate recommendations and proposals in order to homogenise the presentation of National Programmes and also in order to facilitate the STECF task to evaluate the quality of the data collected by the Member States. Moreover, the Regional Co-ordination Meetings held in 2008 identified several issues within the new DCF requiring further work or clarification. Thus, this report reflects the reviews and discussions on the most frequently applied methodologies to collect economic variables for fleet segments and the common approaches proposed to assess data quality. SGECA reached a consensus on a list of recommendations that were proposed to STECF for their possible adoption and endorsement. These should allow MS to better comply with the requirements of the DCF in relation to data quality assurance in a more consistent way within an agreed framework as concerns some basic methods and metadata.