Price indices of the means of agricultural production, input (2000 = 100) - quarterly data
methods, notes and classification
DATA_DESCR The EU Agricultural Price Indices (output and input) comprise: the index of producer prices of agricultural products; the index of purchase prices of the means of agricultural production. The purpose of the price indices is to provide information on trends in producer prices of agricultural products and purchase prices of the means of agricultural production. They are intended to permit a comparison of these trends both between the various Member States and the European Union as a whole and between the different products within a Member State or the European Union. They are also intended to facilitate comparisons between trends in producer prices and trends in purchase prices of the means of agricultural production. They cannot, however, express differences between the Member States in terms of absolute agricultural price levels The following points should be borne in mind when interpreting the EU Agricultural Price Indices: As regards spatial comparisons, the structures of the weights with respect to products and means of production reflect the value of the sales and purchases in each country during the base year. The weights therefore differ from one country to another and this obviously has an effect on trends in the aggregate indices. In comparing the trends in output prices with those in input prices, the field of observation of the latter does not cover, as will be seen later, the whole of the operating expenditure of the agricultural sector. The comparison between quarterly price indices can be made only between the corresponding quarters of different years. The reason is the variation of the weights from quarter to quarter for the output products. In the majority of Member States, national indices of agricultural prices may differ from the EU Agricultural Price Indices in respect of their base, formula or field of observation.
CLASS_SYSTEM The general structure of the EU output and input indices, i.e. the list of groups, subgroups, classes, subclasses and categories for which partial indices should be calculated, is shown in Annex I of the "Handbook for EU agricultural price statistics". However, a number of additional points should also be noted: As the structure of production varies from one country to another, it was left to the discretion of the Member States which representative price series should appear in the subgroup in their own case. When the breakdown of a given level of the classification does not fully cover all the items in the level, a new item Others has been added. The content of this heading could also vary from one country to another quite considerably. Eurostat publishes a combined input price index which comprises the index of the prices of Goods and services for current consumption in agriculture (inputáI) and the index of price of Goods and services contributing to agricultural investment (inputáII). The combined input index does not cover all input items of the agricultural branch and it varies from country to country in its composition. The nomenclature applied in the Agricultural Price Indices is harmonised to the greatest possible extend with the nomenclature of Economic Accounts for Agriculture (EAA) is an integral part of the European system of accounts and therefore for their compilation Eurostat's general classification of economic activities NACE is used. However, it should be noted that few deviations between the two systems exist (agricultural services, FISIM etc.).
STAT_CONC_DEF The purpose of the price indices is to provide information on trends in producer prices of agricultural products and purchase prices of the means of agricultural production. To enable indices of groups of products or an overall index to be compiled from the various elementary indices of prices, it is essential to have a weighting scheme, and the weighting problem is exacerbated in the case of an international index covering several countries. In principle, price indices can relate either to the production of agricultural products and the consumption of the means of production or to sales and purchases, but whichever pairing is chosen the weights must be consistent with them. As the coverage of the EU Agricultural Price Indices are sales and purchases the weights consequently relate to these, and not to production of agricultural products and consumption of the means of agricultural production. The EU Agricultural Price Indices (output and input) comprise: The index of producer prices of agricultural products (output index) is based on the sales of the agricultural products, and the input index is based on the purchases of the means of agricultural production. Several types of indices can be chosen according to the nature of the phenomena they are to describe and to the sources of information available. In most cases however, the principle of the Laspeyres index is at the basis of the index calculation. It can be calculated for a period of several years without being necessary to alter the basket of representative products or the weights. Furthermore the parameters used for the calculation of the indices are well known at the time the base is established. Changes only need to be made when the evolution of the products used and of their relative importance have made the basic structure inappropriate. The value weight attached to each elementary index in the output index is equal to the value of the sales of this product (exclusive of VAT) over the base period. In the framework of the EU Agricultural Price Indices (output), the value of sales should: include the value of production sold to dealers; include the value of direct sales by farmers of crop products made to other agricultural units; include the value of direct sales by farmers on the domestic market; include the value of direct sales by farmers abroad (direct exports); include the value of products processed on the farm, which, except in the case of olive oil and grape must or wine, must be calculated on the basis of the quantities and prices of the raw materials from which they are made; include the value of product related levies/taxes (other than deductible VAT). exclude the value of any monetary compensation received by farmers in respect of the destruction of given quantities of products; exclude the value of subsidies on products which farmers might have received; exclude the value of consumption of own produce on agricultural holdings; exclude the value of products sold from private, non-agricultural gardens; exclude the value of changes in stock; The elementary indices for the prices of animals refer to animals leaving agriculture (slaughter or export) and the weight is calculated as the value of the corresponding sales. Imports of animals are regarded as negligible. By analogy with the output index, the expenditure incurred by farmers in purchasing the means of production, including the purchases of crop products from other agricultural units for intermediate consumption, over the base period constitutes the basic value for calculating the value weights for the input index. This expenditure too is expressed excluding (deductible and reimbursable) VAT. Means of production have to be valued at the purchase price which is the price the purchaser actually pays for the products. It includes taxes less subsidies on products (but excludes deductible taxes like deductible VAT). In the case of the EU Agricultural Price Indices (input), it is assumed by convention that the fertilisers and feedingstuffs purchased are used in the same production period and that there are no stocks on farm. The weights used in the index for Goods and services contributing to agricultural investment represent the expenditure incurred by farmers over the base period in purchasing this kind of goods and services. For a detailed description of the methodology about agricultural price indices (API) see the manual: Handbook for EU Agricultural Price Statistics- version 2.0, March 2008 (See annex at the bottom of the page).
STAT_UNIT Prices should be recorded at points which are as close as possible to those of the transactions which the farmer actually undertakes. This means that product prices should be recorded at the first marketing stage so as to best indicate the actual producer prices received by farmers. Similarly the prices paid by farmers for their means of production should be recorded at the last marketing stage, that at which the items arrive on the farm, so as to best indicate the purchase prices paid by farmers.
STAT_POP The field of observation for a price index covers all the goods and services for which it is desired to measure the price trends. However, there are several concepts which can be distinguished, and these concepts are characterised by a different coverage of agricultural products. Depending on their end use, agricultural products can be divided into two groups: products sold outside the agricultural sector (for direct utilisation or utilisation after processing) or for export; products to be sold within the agricultural sector as means of production, such as animal feeding stuffs, seeds or rearing animals. á
REF_AREA The EU Agricultural Price Indices refer to the Member States at national level. They are not calculated on a regional level.
BASE_PER The Conference of the Directors-General of the National Statistical Institutes of the Community decided that the base for the agricultural indices would be changed every five years with effect from 1970. So a rebasing is done for the years ending in "0" and in "5". The indices in a recent base year should be available every five years in the third year following these base years (i.e. years ending in "3" or "8"). Due to some methodological changes the re-basement in 2005=100 was made with one year delay (2009 instead of 2008). The five-yearly rebasing comprises three major changes: change of the reference year; change of the weighting coefficients to adapt them to changes which have taken place in the last few years in the structure of European agricultural production and in production techniques; update of the data used in order to account for changes in the markets; improvement of harmonisation of the concepts and calculation methods used in the Member States. The general structure of the EU output and input indices, i.e. the list of groups, subgroups, classes, subclasses and categories for which partial indices should be calculated, was changed with the new re-basing for the 2000 = 100 indices. The data are collected via eDamis web forms structured according to the Annex I of the Handbook for EU Agricultural Price Statistics version 2.0, March 2008.
UNIT_MEASURE Agricultural price indices are calculated based on absolute prices.
Methods 
Explanatory Notes 
Variables