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Kåre VassendenStatistics NorwayPresentation for the Joint UNECE/Eurostat Work Session on Migration StatisticsGeneva, 14-16 April 2010

The Nordic agreement on The Nordic agreement on

population registrationpopulation registration

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What this is about

A. The national population registration systems

B. The Nordic agreement on population registration

D. The quality of the statistics: consistency between statistics from different countries

Pop.reg.syst-em

C. Adaption of the register data to statistical needs

NSI

Developing principles and methods for studying the consistency between high quality migration statistics from a limited number of similar countries

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Which are the Nordic countries?

1. Sweden

2. Denmark

3. Finland

4. Norway

5. Iceland

6. Greenland

7. Faroe Islands

”Norden” (in Scandinavian) is divided into …

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B. The Nordic agreement on

population registration

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History

1954: The new Nordic Council proposed a study

1969: An arrangement with Inter-Nordic migration certificates

was introduced

2003: Nordic politicians demanded faster handling of inter-

Nordic migrations

2007: A quite new system was launched based on electronic

flow of data between the Nordic population registration

authorities

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Basic principles of the agreements

• The Nordic countries constitute one population area

• The purpose is to avoid double registration or no registration

• A person is registered as resident in only one country at a time

• The countries keep their own laws and rules. The concept of residence may differ

• The legislation in the country of immigration is decisive. This country makes the decision

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Some abbreviations and terms used

• SC = Sending country /population registration authority

• RC = Receiving country /population registration authority

• NN = a specific (possible) migrant

• Registration of residence = immigration

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Features of the new system

• Inter-Nordic migrants now face the same rules and routines

as other international migrants

• However, the inter-Nordic immigrants are asked to give their

PIN and address (as in SC)

• A dedicated electronic system is used for the

communication between the relevant authorities

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How the system works

1. RC receives a request for residence from NN, who has just

arrived from SC

2. RC may need more information about NN in order to decide

if he qualifies for residence. RC sends a request to SC

3. RC accepts the request for residence. When RC records

the immigration in its database a notice is automatically sent

to SC, informing that NN from now on is registered as

resident in RC

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How the system works (cont.)

5. The relevant office in SC will find NN in a list on the

computer screen

6. SC follows the decision made by RC without any

questioning, and registers NN as emigrated from SC

7. SC use the same date of event as RC

8. After this process, RC may ask SC for supplementary

information on NN

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Notice about the Nordic system!

• A collaboration between the population registration authorities. The NSIs are not involved

• Includes more than sharing data. This is public administration across the borders

• It presupposes …– a certain level of infrastructure– a concept of residence– a general population registration system serving all the society– similar ideologies and traditions of population registration– similar societies– trust between the involved authorities/countries– etc.

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C. In the NSIs:

Adaption of register data to

the statistical needs

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The situation for the Nordic NSIs

• They are supplied with “pre-harmonised” data

• This quality should not be reduced by the process of

producing statistics. New incoherence should not be

introduced into the data

• However, transforming the data into statistics necessarily

means choosing certain conditions for extraction and

processing

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The NSIs may have different policies, procedures and conditions

1. Length of the waiting period before extraction of data

2. Choice of variable for date of event (actual or official)

3. Handling of annulments and corrections

4. Handling of events with a date of event before the

reference year (“the lag”)

May differ:

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The size of the lag

The percentage of lag in Norwegian immigration and emigration statistics *)

*) All migrations, not only the inter-Nordic ones

Immi- Emi-Year gration gration

2005 ………….0,4 11,12006 ………….0,4 9,42007 …………..0,3 8,32008 ………..0,1 11,32009 …………0,3 18,8

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D. The consistency between

the inter-Nordic migration

figures

D1. General discussion

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 To

Grey is according to sending countryWhite is according to receiving country

From Finland Germany Poland Sweden UK

Finland x

2 204 6 3 395 246

761 23 3 428 1 070

Germany

807

x

2 261 2 872 14 558

2 380 82 910 3 786 15 550

Poland

89 104 924

x

1 134 3 534

11 15 013 117 282

Sweden

3 438 3 397 91

x

1 959

3 386 1 580 216 3 676

UK

914 13 197 261 3 022

x708 25 576 3 172 487

Inspiration for the project: the classical “double entry matrix”

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Example of an annual flow

Migration from Denmark to Norway. 2007

Percent-age

Den- Nor- Differ- Highest differ-mark way ence figure ence

2 830 2 956 -126 2 956 -4,3 126 4,3

erences

According tostatistics from

Absoluteversions

of the diff-

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D2. Results so far

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The annual flows *) sorted by percentage difference

*) Annual flows with minimum 10 migrations. Sweden-Faroe Island is not included

05

101520253035

0 25 50 75 100

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Comparing the annual flows

The four worst cases?

Annual flow

Sw → Fi 1993 ……..13,2 436

De → Sw 1990 …………12,3 457

Sw → Fi 1991 …………11,9 638

No → Sw 1990 ………..11,5 989

Difference

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Aggregating the differences

• The 570 annual migration flows cover 737 600 migrations

• The absolute differences sum up to 22 000

• which equals 3 per cent of the migrations

• i.e. the deviation was 3 per cent in the period 1990-2008

• The weight of the countries is proportional to the number of migrations

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The total difference for all migration flows.1990-2008

0

2

4

6

8

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More about the increase from 2006 to 2007

• From 1,8 per cent to 4,0 (+2,2)

• Increase for all countries. Lowest in Norway: 1,6

• If we take away Denmark the total increase is 1,7

• Without Denmark and Finland the total increase is 0,6

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Possible reasons for the setback in 2007

1. New policy in Statistics Denmark: From 2007 lags are excluded from the population statistics

2. The Finnish residence concepts have been a challenge for the new system?

3. Maybe the new exchange system is not as good as the old one, or maybe it has teething troubles?

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Consequences of excluding the lag (1)

Migration from Denmark to Norway. 2004-2009

Percent-age

Den- Differ- Highest differ-Year mark Norway ence figure ence

2004 ……2 899 2 893 6 2 899 0,2 6 0,22005 ……2 894 2 897 -3 2 897 -0,1 3 0,12006 ………2 827 2 828 -1 2 828 0,0 1 0,02007 ……..2 830 2 956 -126 2 956 -4,3 126 4,32008 ……….2 821 2 945 -124 2 945 -4,2 124 4,22009 ………2 937 3 124 -187 3 124 -6,0 187 6,0

differences

According tostatistics from

Absoluteversions

of the

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Consequences of excluding the lag (2)

• Swedish statistics have lost 5 500 emigrations since 1998,

judged by the number of immigrations from Sweden to the

other Nordic countries (from Sweden)

• i.e. Swedish figures for emigration to the Nordic countries

have been 4 per cent too low

• Similarly for Danish statistics since 2007: 945 lost

emigrations, figures 4 per cent too low

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General conclusions

• Strangely enough, the new Nordic data exchange system

may have had a slight negative effect on the statistical

consistency. Too early to conclude

• The NSIs should be aware of their impact on the

consistency

• Excluding the lag definitely reduces the consistency

• Continued monitoring is necessary. The increasing

difference from 2007 should be followed up

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The end