Tourism accounts

What does the research do

Purpose

The tourism accounts provide a quantitative description of tourism in line with the concepts of the national accounts. They provide insight into the expenditure, value added and employment associated with tourism.

Domain description

The tourism accounts comprise the activities of persons traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for leisure, business and other activities not related to activities that are remunerated by the place visited. A time criterion is used to define the normal environment. The normal setting is left if an activity, including travel, lasts more than two hours, but less than a year.

The most important key indicators of the tourism accounts are tourist spending, tourist value added and tourist employment.
Tourist spending is subdivided into expenditure at Dutch companies (“expenditure NL economy”) and expenditure at companies outside of the Dutch economic territory (“Outbound tourism expenditure”). The expenditure at Dutch companies is then broken down into expenditure by non-residents (“Inbound tourism expenditure”), expenditure by residents (“Domestic tourism expenditure”) and other expenditures.

Initial research

The series starts in 2010 onwards. The series is based on the revised figures from the national accounts (Revision 2021). Figures have been recalibrated on the basis of internal and external data sources.

Frequency

Annually.

Publication strategy

The tourism accounts follow the publication strategy of the national accounts. Provisional data are published 8 months after the end of the reporting year. Final data are published 20 months after the end of the reporting year. Information on the release and revision policy of the Dutch National Accounts can be found here: release and revision policy.
The tourism accounts are published annually on StatLine, the electronic database of the CBS.

How is it done

Key sources

The four main sources used are the Statistics Incoming Tourism (NBTC), Statistics Incoming Day Trips (NBTC), the CBS Holiday Survey (only in dutch) and the national accounts (CBS).

Global structure integration framework

National accounts expenditure is divided into tourism and non-tourism expenditure. This is done for so-called characteristic tourism expenditure (hotels and restaurants, transport and travel agencies, cultural services, sports and other recreational activities) and for other expenditures (including recreational shopping). For each activity the value added related to tourism and the employment related to tourism were calculated.

What is the quality of the results

Sequential comparison

Tourism accounts follow the continuity strategy of the national accounts. This strategy implies that the correct measurement of developments is more important than the actual level of a certain variable.

Revisions

Every five years, the national accounts are subject to a thorough revision. A revision for a given year recalibrates all level variables on the basis of available data sources. New sources and calculation methods are introduced. After the revision of the national accounts, the tourism accounts are also revised.

Description quality strategy

Developments in tourist expenditure are checked for plausibility at product level. It is also checked that the tourism totals do not exceed the national totals.